


Remedy for Rivalry

by SpaceWaffleHouseTM



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: 19th Century, Alternate Universe - Arranged Marriage, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Royalty, But Tasteful Miscommunication, Dry Humping, Duchess Rey, Enemies to Lovers, F/M, First Time, Hate Sex, Historical Inaccuracies, Loss of Virginity, Miscommunication, No Pregnancy, One Night Stands, Oral Sex, Prince Ben Solo, Rey takes care of Ben, Sick Character, They Hate Each Other Until They Don't, Vaguely Nineteenth Century
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-05
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 05:34:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 53,468
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23499841
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpaceWaffleHouseTM/pseuds/SpaceWaffleHouseTM
Summary: On his twenty-first birthday, Prince Ben Solo of Alderaan finds out who he's going to be marrying.Unfortunately for him, his parents have chosen his arch-rival, Duchess Rey Kenobi.Also unfortunately for him, they haven't spoken since they escaped their chaperone in an argument last summer and had sex by the lake.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 481
Kudos: 1324
Collections: Anniversary Fic Exchange 2020





	1. Flashback to a Summer Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [crossingwinter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crossingwinter/gifts).



> this is the tropiest thing I have EVER written, but here goes.

Formalwear is the heaviest of all fabrics. Perhaps not in literal weight, but instead in the meaning it carries. When one wears something that can be labeled as such, it’s usually for some great purpose, some grand cause or unfortunate circumstance. 

Tonight, Ben Solo dons a black suit—well, save for the tie, that’s a deep blue. He can’t be seen in pure black after all, lest he be mistaken for attending a funeral. It is perhaps the heaviest thing he’s ever worn even though most of his winter coats wear heavier on his shoulders, and it makes him feel the full weight of his body with every step he takes out of his quarters and into the large corridor that will lead him into the ballroom. 

Tonight, the weight is the heaviest it’s ever been. This is the night he turns twenty-one years of age. It is also the night that he learns whom his parents— _the crown of Alderaan—_ have selected for him to marry. Law decrees that if a prince cannot find a match by his twenty-first birthday, the crown chooses for him. 

His mother spent the entirety of his twentieth year finding him someone, and now the moment has arrived for him to find out who that is. 

Footsteps echo down the hallway, and over the blood rushing in his ears, it takes him several seconds to realize it’s his. Ben is so on edge he feels as though he can hardly breathe, musing briefly that perhaps it is he who will be needing a fainting couch tonight rather than any woman present. What will his fiancé think of him for having such thoughts? Will she think less of him or will she find him to be only human?

He has no idea who she is, what she’s like, or what her name is. Everything is, as usual, a mystery he must unravel. 

The ballroom is alive when he gets there. Already music is playing from the far side of the grand room, and some people are dancing while others drink from the abundance of wine his parents have provided. Flowy skirts and intricately woven hairstyles fill his gaze, each person in the room seeming as if they’re desperate to outdo the next. Most likely to find themselves in good standing with the King and Queen. 

That’s how it usually works, after all. 

The aforementioned royal couple is standing near the thrones positioned at the forefront of the room speaking with a young woman whose face he cannot see. Her back is turned to him, her gloved hands folded in a blur of white at the base of her spine as she laughs at something his father has just said. Fabric a shade paler than the blue of the sky rests on her form, highlighting a tall and lean silhouette that strikes him as oddly familiar. A vague part of him begins to ponder if this is who they intend to marry him off to, but he shakes the thought from his mind. There’s hundreds of people in this room, and only one of them can be destined to take his hand in marriage. 

_What are the odds?_ he muses to himself, making his way toward the King and Queen, already prepared to make profuse apologies for his tardiness. 

When he reaches them, however, his mother simply smiles at him, holding out her hand. “I see you are simply older rather than wiser,” she teases as he takes her arm, and stands at her side. The woman they’re with is still facing his father, and hasn’t acknowledged Ben yet, but she’s wearing three buns in a style native to the neighboring kingdom of Jakku, and suddenly his heart plunges in his chest with dread. _There’s no way._

“Please, mother, I was simply gathering my wit,” he protests, causing his father and the woman keeping them company to chuckle as he gives her a weak smile. “There is hope for me yet.”

An amused sigh escapes his father as the two lock eyes, bowing their heads toward one another in acknowledgment. “Not if you inherited your wit from me, there isn’t.”

“Your majesty, forgive me, you shouldn’t slight yourself, I find your wit rather charming,” the woman who’s with them says, her voice much deeper and again more familiar than he’d been expecting, and suddenly a chord is struck within him as he glimpses her face for the first time.

As soon as he lays eyes on her, it becomes apparent that this is not the first time he’s seen this woman.

His father says something in response, likely equally witty as it makes his mother laugh, but the sound falls flat on his ears as he looks into hazel eyes he hasn’t seen in a year. The Duchess of Jakku looks just as lovely as she had the last time he’d seen her, when they’d gone for a stroll by a nearby lake in an attempt to clear the bad blood between them, suddenly slipped their chaperone, and—

“Ben…” Dappled sunlight and the scent of pine bursts forth from his memory, a sound like a high-pitched whine, then the cry of his name echoes in his ears, and he starts putting together the pieces of a puzzle he hadn’t even known he was building. His jaw falls slack ever so slightly, his body feeling faint again under the weight of his clothes. 

He wonders if she feels the same weight, if the dress that cuts low on her chest and the corset aiding her posture feel heavy on her body as she stares at him. It looks good on her, he thinks. The gentle blue is a flattering color on her skin tone, and the skirt flares out just enough at her waist to highlight its shape. The tiny lace embroidery seems as if its trying to tell a story on her chest and abdomen, but it’s all a distraction from the meaning the dress carries.

Is it the same for her as it is for him? Is she here because his parents decided that _she’s_ his match? Does she feel as terrified as he does right now? 

It’s a feeling he wouldn’t wish on his worst enemy, and that person is, at the moment, _her._

The Duchess Rey Kenobi has been an acquaintance of his since his youth. The neighboring kingdom she hails from has had a healthy alliance with Alderaan for centuries, but never any formal ties, until— _oh…_

“... and for that reason, we believe the Duchess is the perfect match for you,” his mother is saying as he comes back to reality, his body seeming to freeze from some sort of shock as he looks between the three people in his space. 

“Pardon?”

“We have been writing letters to the King of Jakku,” his father explains, then Ben meets Rey’s eyes, observing for the first time that she seems about as happy with this as he does. “I know you have a bad history, but so long as the two of you consent, the next time we all gather in this hall will be to celebrate your wedding.”

Feeling frozen up again, Ben glances at Rey, wondering if she feels the same sort of anxiety about this as he currently is. Does she want this? Would she mind? They’ve been rivals for as long as he can remember. The only minute they’d spent together in which they hadn’t been arguing had been that one moment last summer when his face had been buried between her thighs, his tongue so deep inside of her cunt there was no chance for him to form words. 

His mouth opens and closes for a few seconds as the flashbacks start taking over, then he bows his head towards the Duchess. “It depends on you, your grace,” he says, recalling the last time he’d called her by her title. “All on you.”

*

_He enters her slowly, shaking from how wet she is, how wet he’d made her through the actions of his tongue. There’s a small gasp in his ear as her face cinches from a brief pain, but just as he’s starting to become worried and concerned, she gives him a tiny nod. “It’s okay,” she whispers. “I’m okay.”_

_What he wants to tell her is, “you’re perfect,” but he’s a coward, he doesn’t. Instead, he just nods back, and begins to push a little further inside of her. “Are you afraid?” he asks her, unsure why he’s asking the question as he stops, both of them acknowledging with their eyes that he’s gone far enough._

_“No, are you?”_

_“I am.” Then he begins to thrust, his lips finding her pulse point as he sucks a little bruise there, and she sighs against him._

_“Ben…” she breathes, and he quickly loses himself in the feeling of her, his body surrendered to hers as he fucks her gently into the picnic blanket, the wind blowing his hair into his eyes as they become thoroughly disheveled._

_His hands wander everywhere. One of them he uses to brace himself over her, supporting his own weight so he isn’t crushing her, but the other cups her jaw, then his fingers ghost gently over her neck, feeling the tiny little ridges of her throat as he then makes his way down onto her collarbone, then her breast, palming her gently through the fabric._

_One of her hands comes over his, fingers pressing onto him as she curls them beneath the neckline, and tugs it gently down. He gasps her name as his fingers brush over her hardened nipple, pinching it between two of them as she sighs beneath him. She’s enjoying this as much as he is, and as he rubs soft little circles into her skin, he thinks that perhaps he could even come from this alone, just touching her and making her sing beneath him._

_Never mind the fact that his cock is currently sheathed inside of her. That means nothing compared to the feeling of her slowly falling apart from his touch. It’s not even a physical feeling, not entirely, it just feels so damn good that he can’t get enough of it._

_Slowly, he releases her nipple from his fingers, his palm covering her entire breast as she pulls him back up to her mouth, and he sees stars as she kisses him so hard he’s rendered breathless. It’s short, but it’s the most raw and intense thing he’s ever experienced before he’s kissing her jaw again, his lips finding her neck and kissing her slowly, sensually, just the way she likes it._

_By that point, she’s moaning into his ear with every thrust, her body singing in time with his as they both call out one another’s names, both too lost to pleasure to think anything else. Normally they’d be spending their time together arguing, but right now, all of his thoughts are focused on making the Duchess beneath him come apart._

_In spite of the loathing he feels for her, he thinks she’s beautiful like this. As he pulls back from her neck to watch her face, he finds himself entranced with the way her shiny, brunette hair has fanned out around her head, having come loose from the traditional buns worn by women of Jakku. Her skin is flushed a gentle shade of peach, a warm color that he wants to paint the sky with as he thrusts into her again, and his eyes drift lower._

_One of the Duchess’ breasts has come free from her dress, the low neckline revealing even more of her already exposed skin and the dusky pink of a nipple. She looks thoroughly debauched, he thinks, like something out of a story that’s made its way free from a brothel, but what’s happening here?_

_This may have started as a culmination of an argument, his body pressing hers against a tree as he kissed her insults from her lips, but now it’s evolved into something far more tender and gentle. She’s almost sweet with him in the way she kisses, in the way her hands roam his back as they_ — _can they call this lovemaking_ — _fuck over the blanket they’re supposed to be using for a picnic._

_“Ben,” she whispers one last time, her eyes shutting softly as her head tilts back against the ground._

_His lips find her neck again just as she starts to come apart around him, and his entire world is changed._

*

“Yes, it’s quite all right with me,” Rey answers after a while, her lips shifting as she swallows back what she really wants to say. “It is our duty, I suppose.”

“Right, duty,” he repeats dully, the eye contact between them still refusing to break as they agree to tie themselves together for life. It’s just business, right? Nothing personal. That’s how this works with people of their status anyway. 

Royalty doesn’t marry for love, they marry for alliances, for profit. It’s a business transaction, and if she were anyone else, he wouldn’t feel anything about this, but she’s _Rey._ This is the woman he lost his virtue to, the woman he gave a piece of his very soul to, and it’s fitting that she’d also be the woman he marries, but—

They haven’t spoken since that day by the lake, since he kissed her in the glare of the sun’s reflection off of its sparkling waters and then taken her in the green grass beside its shores, their picnic blanket doing little to ease the strain on his knees as he tasted her for the first—and so far the last—time.

“We should leave you to talk, then,” his mother said, then she rested her other hand on his arm. “Be civil, please, I don’t want the Princess of Takodana to be my daughter in law.”

“I will, mother,” he promises her, then his mother gently pats his arm, and reaches out for his father, both of them nodding their heads as they walk away, leaving Ben to awkwardly stand by Rey as the music from the band playing on the far side of the room begins to fill his ears once more. 

They stand awkwardly for a few seconds, and Ben takes in the daylight still streaming in through the high set windows to light the room. Their grand chandelier is lit, the candles within its chambers burning bright as well as the entire room shines with its light, but somehow there still seems to be a cloud over the room, a shadow cast over the two people standing nearest the grand staircase. 

Warm hues from the setting sun are cast over both of their faces, making it seem as if the ballroom has been set on fire, but something tells him they are the smoke. 

“You look well, your highness,” Rey says, then she smoothes out her white-gloved hands over the bodice of her pale blue gown. 

“As do you.”

“But why the hell would you agree to marry me? We can’t stand to be in the same room together.”

“If I recall, your grace, it was you who agreed to marry me.”

“Yes, well, I only agreed to marry you because you said that you’d agree to marry me if I agreed to marry you—”

Scoffing, Ben steps back, shaking his head. “You are putting words in my mouth, Rey, I only implied such a thing.”

“Don’t be an ass,” she hisses, then she steps forward, and looks out at the rest of the room. “People are staring at us.”

He turns his head to the party, observing that anyone who is not presently dancing is now whispering quietly and occasionally looking in their direction. _Perfect,_ just what they need to make an already tense situation worse. It would seem his mother has already set about telling people about their engagement, likely before either of them had agreed to it, and everyone knew all along that this party wasn’t just to celebrate the anniversary of his birth, but to celebrate his engagement as well. “That they are.”

“We should dance,” Rey says, looking down at his hands. “It’s only customary for a courting couple to dance.”

“I wouldn’t call this courting, we’re already engaged, and even if it was, you’d be the last person I’d ever consider to court me.”

“And you’d be the same for me.” She looks down at his hand again, then a sly grin tugs gently at the corners of her lips, so small that if he weren’t this close to her, he wouldn’t know it was there. “Well? Society would frown upon it if I were to offer you _my_ hand.”

“I would so hate to displease society,” he mutters in response, then he offers her his hand, and she takes it, the warmth of her skin radiating straight through the satin of his gloves as he guides her out onto the center of the ballroom floor, and they join the other couples, whirling out into the dance floor as rosy and tangerine hues fade to azure skies and emerald grass. 

*

_He still isn’t sure how he ended up here. All he remembers is her telling him to, “shut up, shut up!” and then she was kissing him. They're still kissing, actually, still pressed up against an oak tree as his hands drift down slowly from her waist to her ass, palms groping her through the many layers of her skirts as she keens against him, her head tilting back as she gasps for air, her own hands resting soundly against his chest, but gripping the fabric as if she’s holding on for dear life._

_They stay like that for a few seconds, both of them breathing hard even as his hands find a firm grip on her ass, and he lifts her up into his arms, her legs wrapping around his waist as he presses her against the tree again, and they both stare at one another as if having a silent conversation._

_Perhaps they are, he thinks as her breath ghosts over his nose, warming his face as a breeze blows past them off of the lake, the clear, blue water reflecting sunlight almost directly into their eyes. “Ben,” she whispers, her voice higher in pitch than normal, lilting on the breeze as he looks at her through the hair that’s fallen into his eyes._

_They’ve only just begun, but they’re both disheveled beyond repair. One of Rey’s buns is in serious danger of falling loose, the sleeve of her gown threatening to tumble down her shoulder onto her arm, and there’s a stitch torn in those pretty, satin gloves of hers._

_He doesn’t give a horse’s shit about the torn state of her gloves, though, because right now, she’s looking at him like she’s seeing him for the first time. Her hazel eyes are hooded, but he can still see a kaleidoscope of colors within them as she looks up at him with wonder. “Don’t talk,” he whispers, then she nods, and he’s kissing her again, understanding for the first time what it means for something to be holy._

_Kissing her makes him feel like he’s experiencing something bigger than himself, even though the second coming together of their lips isn’t quite as intense as the first. In fact, this time it’s softer, more gentle, easier rather than difficult, and it’s almost as if they’ve forgotten how much they hate each other for a few seconds._

_Then her hands grip his hair, tugging him tightly against her, and he knows she remembers the hatred, the loathing as they melt together, two becoming one as the sun’s heat causes sweat to break out on his brow._

_“Rey, are you sure?” he asks her quietly, breaking away to kiss her jaw, her neck, as she continues to cling to him like he’s her lifeline._

_“Just stop talking and kiss me again.” Then before he can make good on that command, she kisses him first, and he’s whirling her away from their tree toward the ground, both of them landing more gently than he’d expected as he finds himself on top of her, pressing her into the fabric of the picnic blanket they’d laid out._

_The food, the intended purpose of the blanket, the lake, the world, their titles, are all forgotten, and all he can feel is the power of the emotions he carries towards her, and the sudden feeling that the chemicals in his brain are rearranging them into something new._

*

“You’re thinking about it, are you not?” Rey asks him, interrupting his thoughts as they dance, stepping away from one another before pulling together, joining hands as they circle one another. “That picnic we had.”

“I would hardly call it a picnic.” A sound bordering on a scoff escapes him as they then join into a proper waltz once more. “You were the meal.”

His fiance glares at him as they dance on through the ballroom floor. “You’re a pig.” She sneers at him, then quickly gathers her composure, her face regaining neutrality as quickly as she can manage. It is improper for a Duchess to glare at a Prince like that. Much less one who is now her fiance. “No, a pig is too good for you, you’re an ass, Ben Solo, a lowly ass not even worthy of—”

“Ah, your grace, you forget yourself, that’s no way to speak to your fiance.”

“Neither of us wants to be the other’s fiance.”

And like that, he can sense whatever magic had formed in the brief reprieve they’d found by the lake vanishing. All traces of camaraderie, of tenderness, have disappeared and made way for that same, familiar despisement that they’ve always carried for one another. “Ah, there it is.”

“There what is?” Her voice is oddly soft again, almost like it had been when she’d whispered his name that day by the lake. 

“That fire in your eyes,” he answers, watching the light of the setting sun catch in her irises again as they drift near the edge of the floor. “The hatred you carry for me. I’d thought for a moment that it may have faded, but I seem to be wrong.”

Her teeth hover over her lower lip for a moment as if she’s tempted to bite it, but then she settles against it, opting instead to grip him a little more tightly in both hands, her fingers digging into his hand and shoulder. “You haven’t spoken to me in a year, your highness,” she reminds him, her eyes suddenly seeming sad as she looks at him. “You took my virtue—”

“And you took mine.”

“Yes, but you still didn’t speak to me for a year after. Our kingdoms are not far, it wouldn’t be impossible for you to write? To ask after me?”

“I seem to recall you asking me to never speak of what had happened again,” he whispers, reminding her of what she’d said when they’d lain next to one another in the aftermath, sun shining off of their sweat-soaked skin. “You told me to never address what had happened between us, and since outside of that one little moment we’ve always despised one another, forgive me if I assumed that meant you wanted no contact at all.” Scoffing, he sighs, the hand at her back gripping the laces a little more snugly, as if he were attempting to repeat that summer afternoon all over again. “You could’ve written me, too.”

Swallowing, Rey grits her teeth as if she’s struggling to hold back a string of insults. “Perhaps, but I assumed if you wanted to talk, you would’ve said something. I figured your continued silence was a sign that the loathing had resumed in full.”

“It has.” It shocks him how much his voice resembles a growl, how much he means what he says, but there’s a part of him that’s currently screaming to break free, that wants to assure her that he doesn’t mean a word of what he’s saying, and wants her to know how deeply he regrets never speaking to her after their coupling. “I have no doubt.”

That’s a lie, he knows it is, and as she looks up at him, he suspects she knows it, too, but he can’t help how easily it falls from his lips. In all honesty, it’s astonishing how easy it is, though, to convince himself that he means it, that he hates her. He supposes a part of him does, a majority of him does, and has ever since she spent their first dance as children stepping on his toes—on _purpose_ —starting a rivalry that had only escalated, but now there’s a tiny part of him that knows what she sounds like when she comes. That part of him is what he’s afraid of, because that part of him yearns to hear it again, to better commit it to memory. 

*

_Feeling Rey come apart around him nearly sends him over the edge, his fingers grasping at the fabric of their picnic blanket as he stutters momentarily in his thrusts. It takes him a second or two to get his bearings even though she’s still whispering his name, still moaning as she continues to fall apart, and he thinks he’s going to fade out of existence as the last of her orgasm fades, and he knows his isn’t far behind._

_As quickly as he can, he pulls out of her_ — _the last thing they need from this unexpected tryst is a bastard child, he knows_ — _stroking himself to completion as she watches, then he sighs as his come hits the blanket beneath them, a few drops landing unfortunately within the layers of her skirts, but otherwise only staining the blanket._

_He sympathizes with the poor maid who will have to wash these later._

_Both of them are panting hard as they come down from their highs, the weight of what they’ve done finally seeming to settle in as their eyes meet, and he’s not sure what he’d been expecting to see in hers, but it certainly hadn’t been this_ — _this_ —

_He’s not sure what to call the thing he sees in the hazel depths, but it isn’t the usual distaste she’s given him over the past several years that they’ve known each other. The way she’s looking at him now is almost tender, sweet, and dare he say, affectionate. It’s different than anything else she’s ever given him, and he himself feels differently towards her already._

_They’ve seen the most vulnerable parts of each other now. Surely that means things must be on the cusp of changing?_

_Curious to find out, he lets his eyes drift down to her lips, then before he can lose his nerve, he leans in and presses a kiss to her lips, his body coming alive again at the contented hum she makes against him. Her hands find their way into his hair again, tugging on it to pull him closer as their lips move sweetly against one another, seeming to find their rhythm with the music nature has provided them. With every gentle lap of the little waves in the lake against the shore, every chirp of a bird, and every rustle of the grass in the wind, he falls into her a little more, wondering if this is it, if this is truly the moment where everything changes for them._

_The kiss deepens as Rey shifts her hips, turning them over so that she’s the one on top of him, and his arms immediately wrap around her waist, holding her close against him as she dishevels him even further. Her hands soon find his, her fingers wrapping around his wrists as she takes them away from her waist, and moves them up. He finds himself unexpectedly pliant as she pins his wrists above his head, seizing control of the kiss as they continue to move together._

_Lying there by the lake like that with her on top of him and his hands pinned above his head is the most at peace he thinks he’s ever felt. On any other day, the two of them would be at war, feuding viciously in a way that would shame both of their countries, but now?_

_He finds, weirdly enough, that he likes it best like this. All he can hope for is that she feels the same._

_Of course, all illusions must come to an end. Before he’s ready, Rey breaks the kiss, and as his eyes slowly blink open, his lips parting in what he senses will soon become a smile, he realizes she isn’t smiling. She looks shellshocked, ashamed, and almost embarrassed. “Forgive me, your highness,” she says, then she crawls off of him, tucking her loose breast back into the neckline of her dress as she searches the ground for the ribbons that had tied her buns._

_“Forgive you?” he asks, confused. “What for?”_

_“I’ve acted inappropriately, I shouldn’t have.”_

_“Well, so did I,” he says with a laugh, but she doesn’t return the laugh. His face falls as he realizes how she’s looking at him. It’s the same way she used to. She’s looking at him like she hates him again, and his heart sinks into his stomach as he realizes that nothing has changed between them. This was a momentary lapse, a weak link in the chain, and now it has been repaired. “Oh…”_

_“Please, can we never speak of this again? No one can ever know.” Shaking her head, she swallows back what seems to be a massive lump in her throat. “We never should’ve slipped our chaperone.”_

_“He was sleeping.”_

_“We still shouldn’t have done it. Any of it.”_

_He wants to argue, wants to fight it, but all he can do is grit his teeth, and struggle not to scream as he realizes that the sun has grown dim. In reality, it has just been temporarily concealed by a cloud, but he can’t help but feel as if the encounter they’d just shared has flickered out and died like a candle. “Fine, we’ll never speak of this again,” he says, tempted to say something else, but she doesn’t appear to be listening to him anymore as she reties her hair._

_They are right back to where they started. He’d thought they’d made an earth-shattering leap forward. He had been wrong._

_It is now unlikely that they will ever find this camaraderie again, that they will ever look at one another with anything but hatred as long as they both live._

*

“Good, then we’re in agreement about what sort of marriage this will be,” Rey says, and he finds himself nodding almost absentmindedly as he confirms her statement. 

“Yes, we are,” he answers her, though it almost pains him to do so as he remembers that last kiss, as he remembers his hands above his head and her lips on his, stealing his oxygen as she held him down. 

He’s tempted to ask her why she agreed to marry him if that’s the case, but he knows, logically, that tying Jakku and Alderaan together is the best thing for either of them. The same way his parents had sewn an alliance between Alderaan and Corellia with their marriage, they are doing so for their countries now. It shouldn’t be anything, and it won’t be anything where emotions are involved, and yet he can’t help but wonder what it would be like if they had managed to change things that day last summer. 

All he can do now is force himself to forget that afternoon. He can’t think about that anymore, he just has to move forward, to try and deal with his situation as best he can, and hope that maybe someday, they’ll be able to talk about the magic they’d found by the lake.


	2. The Truth in the Lies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all so much for your response on the last chapter, it was wonderful to see <3

In his dreams, though he doesn't yet know that he's dreaming, he’s surrounded by light; a golden, brilliant light that he feels as if he can reach out and touch. Dust particles wander about in the air, shining white and almost silver as his fingers wander through the rays, but none of it outshines  _ her.  _

A radiant smile and hazel eyes light up his vision as if they’d been made for him. Laughter more musical than the song of a bird fills his ears, her voice playful as she whispers his name, and brushes a strand of hair out of his eyes. Finally, he can see her, can see every magnificent little part of her, and maybe that’s not a word he would use normally but in this state, he is just shy of fascinated. 

Ben knows he must be staring at her in wonder, but this woman lying on top of him, pressing him into the ground with her weight is shining as though she is a star that has descended from the heavens. No, not just any woman,  _ Rey _ . This is Rey, this is the one woman he’d never thought he’d find himself with ever again. It’s impossible that she’s here, and as he tries to retrace the steps and see how he got here, he realizes that the golden hue of her skin is a touch too unnatural for reality, and everything is slightly blurred, their voices echoing off the walls. 

His breath catches just before she kisses him like she had last summer, and he knows instantly that none of this is real. 

The dream has taken him back to the lake, and since that is an impossible thing, he must be imagining it. Still, it feels good to kiss her again, even if he is angry with her for choosing to ignore that something beautiful had happened between them by that lake. 

_ You could’ve said something, too,  _ a little voice in his head reminds him.  _ You could’ve fought.  _

The voice is right, but in a moment of predictable cowardice, he ignores it in favor of comfort and self-preservation. Rey doesn’t want to explore that path any further, she’d told him so. Even if he does say something now, the point is moot. 

He feels like pure, utter horse shit, and given the way the woman in his dreams is looking at him now, he also feels hopeless. He hates her too, he thinks, or rather, he wants to hate her, but whether or not he actually does? Sinking deeper into the pits of denial seems as if it may be the best course of action. 

The sun is still shining when he finally wakes up, and he suddenly understands why his dream had taken on such a golden hue. A groan escapes him as he turns over, shielding the sunlight from his eyes with a pillow as he notices that it’s already late enough in the day that he should be up and moving. The people who help him dress in the mornings are going to be here at any moment, and while they are sworn to secrecy, no one needs to see him all miserable and pining—

_ Pining _ , what a ridiculous word. He isn’t pining, he’s simply…  _ mourning  _ the loss of his idea of a happy and loving marriage. Both he and his wife—his future wife, he reminds himself, their wedding isn’t for another couple of months—have resigned themselves to the fact that they hate each other. 

Or on his end, the fact that he wants to hate her very, very badly and is struggling to accept any other emotion with regards to the Duchess who is now his fiancé. They’ve never gotten along, he knows this. They’ve only ever regarded one another with animosity since they were young, barely teenagers when they’d met, and he sees no reason why that should change now. What had happened last summer was a slip, a fluke in the grand scheme of their relationship. 

It shouldn’t haunt him as it does and he vows to somehow push the thought from his mind. 

Not a minute later, the household staff knocks on his door, and he groans as he rises from the bed, throwing back the sheets before he straightens his nightclothes, and moves to invite them in. If he’s going to encounter his fiance today, regardless of his present feelings towards her, he needs to look presentable.

*

Breakfast presents him with a new challenge. His parents chatter animatedly, both far more excited for the upcoming wedding than he is. Ben, meanwhile, sits bored at his end of the table, sipping casually at the cup of tea that’s been poured for him, but not really tasting it. 

He finds himself tired of listening to his parents’ chatter. For the past year since he’d turned twenty—and really, from the moment he’d grown from a boy into a man—he’s been pestered about this day, and now it’s been set in stone. Two months, and not even that. As of today, he has one month and thirty days until he is to be wed to Rey of Jakku. 

Until he is to be trapped in a marriage with a woman who hates him, and won’t acknowledge that for even a moment, the storm clouds over the two of them lifted. 

“Ben?” his mother asks, interrupting him from the gloom of his current thoughts. 

“Hmm?” He sets his teacup down, blinking attentively as he comes back into the real world. 

“When you meet with Rey this afternoon, would you try to be cordial? For me?”

Scoffing, he bites back a sarcastic retort, not wanting to deal with the reprimanding he would inevitably get in response as he nods. “Believe it or not, mother, it is not me who has problems with being cordial,” he says, then he picks up his fork, and begins plucking at the food on his plate. “Why don’t you ask the Duchess why she hates me so much?”

“Duchess Rey is a wonderful woman, I don’t understand—”

“You wouldn’t.” He sets down his fork, then he looks across the table at his father, who only seems to be smirking towards his food as he listens to the conversation. “Is something funny?”

“Your mother and I started out like this, you know,” he tells him, picking at his own food, then as he chews on his next bite, he chuckles through his closed lips. “Loathing one another. It’s quite easy to mislabel emotions of passion as loathing.”

This time he laughs. “Perhaps that may be the case with you, but I’ve seen the way Rey looks at me.”

_ Like he’s the sun, like he’s the eighth of the seven wonders, as if he’s a magician pulling love from a hat. _

But that was a dream, wasn’t it? He will never have the beauty of having someone look at him like that in reality. It’s like he said, the way Rey looks at him? It isn’t with love. It’s disdain, he’s certain of it. There’s nothing else it could possibly be, not now, and not ever. All she will ever give him, however long they both live, however long their marriage lasts, is hatred. Pure and simple. 

“She doesn’t like me, much less love me, father,” he reminds them, shoving the image of the Duchess on that one day, that one mistake of a day, from his mind. “There is nothing between us.”

“Denial is unbecoming on you, my son,” his father says, then he sets down his fork. 

“There’s no denying anything, I would be a fool to deny the facts.”

“Yes, you would,” his father says, and the room falls silent for a moment, all three of them pausing as if to register the weight of what his father has just said, then his mother reaches over, and grasps his father’s hand, muttering on about the tailor they will hire to design Ben’s wedding clothes. 

The conversation clearly over, Ben sits back and resigns himself to just casually observing the encounter as his parents discuss his future, and he finds himself wondering if he will ever know peace. 

*

_ The carriage bumps along the path between his castle and the manor she’s temporarily calling home on this visit, the two people inside of it sitting caddy-corner to one another and not looking at each other. Both of them have their eyes trained firmly out the window, neither willing to look at the other. He can’t bring himself to look at her, either, her insensitive comment on his private life from ten minutes prior still ringing in his head.  _

_ It had just been a barb, a dig that held no meaning and only meant to get under his skin, but it had worked just as she’d intended it to.  _

_ Eventually, the dig bothers him enough that he breaks the stare he’s currently engaging in with the green trees that surround them, and he looks at her, watching as her eyes stare blankly at the lake. Without having to ask, he knows she’s not actually looking at the water, her mind is somewhere else. Curiosity peaks inside of him, and he crosses one leg over the other, cupping his own jaw as he watches her.  _

_ “I can feel you staring,” she says interrupting his thoughts. “Why?” _

_ “Why what?” Even though he knows good and well what she’s asking. He can’t help but antagonize her, it’s what he’s good at. It’s what they’re  _ both  _ good at.  _

_ “Oh, shove a poker up your ass, Ben Solo, you know damn well what I meant.” _

_ Snickering quietly to himself, he shakes his head, watching as she turns her eyes on him. “Because I am wondering how you can accuse me of ‘having my way with every noble woman in Alderaan,’ when the accusation has no base? You do not know what I do behind closed doors, and it happens to be none of your business.” _

_ “And I would like to know how you can accuse my grandfather of stealing the throne? He was born into it just like your mother,” she protests, crossing her arms over her chest. “It would kill you not to act like a lowly piece of cow manure for two minutes, wouldn’t it?” _

_ “Ah, so I’m cow shit now, am I? Is that the best you could come up with, Rey?” He's sneering at her now, and if his mother were here, she’d say it was unbecoming of him, but luckily, the only person in the carriage is his rival. He can sneer for the time being. “I had thought your class made you above such insults. Or perhaps your age, since we are both adults.” _

_ Scoffing, Rey points a finger at him, her nose crinkling with rage as she gives him a stare that could bore a hole through his skull. “Don’t you  _ dare  _ insinuate that I am somehow lesser than you for my choice in insults when you are  _ always  _ the one who starts throwing the proverbial punches first.” _

_ “Me? Always? I seem to recall, your grace, that the first blow delivered today was from you.” _

_ “All right, fine! Most of the time, then, but regardless, it always comes from you!” _

_ “Fine! But you always regard me with such an animosity that I can’t help but want to get the inevitable argument over with! So yes, I insult you first, but that is simply because I just want to finish our time together as quickly as possible! So I can get you out of my sight!” _

_ She stiffens at this, her entire body going rigid while his relaxes, but in place of that tension he’d felt building inside of him the entire time he now feels a hole. Regret immediately floods his body as he realizes how much he hates what he’s just said. It’s heinous, it’s terrible, and he never should’ve spoken to her that way, but… _

_ “I’m—“ _

_ “Stop the carriage,” she says, stopping him before he can make the apology.  _

_ “What?” _

_ “For god’s sake, turn around, open the window, and ask the driver to stop the carriage.” _

_ Blinking at her in confusion, Ben turns around, and reaches for the knob that will open their window to the driver. “Pardon me,” he says upon opening it. “Would you stop and let us off here, sir? The Duchess and I would like to set our picnic down by the lake.” _

_ “Yes, your highness,” the man driving their carriage replies, then he hears the horses neigh as they come to a stop, and he shuts the window again before looking at Rey.  _

_ “Grab the basket, I’ll get the blanket,” Ben says, reaching for the blanket at his feet as she bites her lip, and takes hold of the basket as he’d asked. “This is going to be a long day.” _

_ * _

A few hours later, they are once again walking through the grounds outside of his castle. Her hand is hot on his arm, to the point where he feels as if he’s being burned by some sort of poker. They’re walking by the pond on the grounds, which is hilariously fed by the same water system that feeds the lake. 

All those tributaries and they still somehow lead to the same places. 

Today, he isn’t weighed down by the heft of formalwear, but the clothing he wears—this time a navy blue waistcoat over a white shirt—but somehow the weight of the world around him still feels remarkably heavy nonetheless. He would probably feel crushed under the weight of his own skin, if they were walking around as naked as the day they were born. 

They are not, however, naked, not even a little bit. 

Rey, in fact, is wearing an extra layer compared to what she wore yesterday. Her dress is a soft pink, hidden slightly around her shoulders and waist by a white jacket that probably keeps her warm against the cool, spring winds and the shade of the trees whose branches they walk beneath. 

From the outside, they must look like any ordinary couple taking a stroll, but they both know that on the inside, there is a war stirring within both of their guts. 

The same awkward silence that had followed them on their carriage ride a year ago follows them now, and Ben just wants to get this over with, just wants to tell her goodbye and retreat to the castle to wallow in his misery. Perhaps he’ll spend a few hours in the library, reading books he’s neglected for too long, or maybe he’ll summon one of the knights he’s friends with. It has been too long since he rode on horseback with Poe or Armitage, since the three of them had invaded a tavern in the dead of night or even held a conversation. There hadn’t exactly been time for it lately. 

“The flowers look lovely today,” Rey says, her tone dull, disinterested as if she couldn’t care less about what she was saying. 

It’s a vain attempt to spark a conversation, and it isn’t the one he wants to have. 

Groaning softly, he shakes his head, then he sighs. “Don’t.”

“Don’t what?”

“Don’t talk to me about the flowers as if there isn’t something else you  _ know  _ we need to talk about instead,” he replies, his voice almost a growl as he thinks back to that day, closing his eyes as if it will transport him back, and change everything that happened since then. The birds and the breeze ruffling the trees even sound the exact same as they did that day. “You  _ know _ .”

“There is nothing to discuss,” she protests, pulling on his arm as she brings their walk to a stop. “I don’t want to discuss what happened last year with you.” She then begins to move forward, preparing to make her escape from the conversation, but then he reaches out, and grabs hold of her arm, spinning her back in towards him until she’s pressed against his chest, and suddenly for the first time in a year, he’s holding her close. 

“And yet, it happened, Rey.” His voice is almost a whisper, his lips barely move, but the words and all their severity ring loud and clear in the air. Even the birds seemed to have ceased conversation, as if they too are listening in. “You kissed me, then I laid you down on that picnic blanket we’d set out and I deflowered us both. I want you to look me in the eyes and then tell me something, just one thing, then maybe, just maybe, I can finally leave it alone.”

Her nose twitches again, that same rage he knows well filling her as she tries to come up with a response. “What do you want?”

*

_ The kiss grows heated as they hit the ground, well, as he sets her down upon the blanket with a tenderness that surprises even him. What shocks him more, though, is the way she returns it, the way she’s kissing him almost sweetly, as if he means something to her.  _

_ He almost wants to ask why, but he’s scared of what it’ll mean when he gets the answer.  _

_ All he knows is his hands are so far up her skirts he doesn’t think he’ll ever untangle them, but he doesn’t want to. He’s pulling aside her underthings and he can feel her beneath his fingers. At first, he fears she may not want him there, but then one hand tightens its grip in his hair and the other takes his and guides his fingers to the apex of her thighs, and suddenly he’s frighteningly aware of how wet she is.  _

_ Ben doesn’t have the best education when it comes to things like this, but he knows what it means when a woman is wet. She wants this, she wants  _ him.  _ Rey, his arch enemy, his rival in all things, and the Duchess of fucking Jakku, is wet for  _ him. 

_ “Fuck,” he breathes against her lips, taking a break from kissing her to breathe as he then starts trailing kisses down on her neck. His finger slips gently down against her entrance, and he can feel her gasp beneath him, his name now the sexiest thing he’s ever heard—at least, when he hears it from her lips, it is.  _

_ “You want this?” he asks against her neck. “With me?” _

_ The answer comes without hesitation, lightning quick with no time before the thunder. “Yes. I want this.” She opens her eyes as he pulls back, looking up at him from beneath hooded lids. “I want you.” _

_ His cock becomes impossibly hard in his trousers, his whole body shuddering as his eyes close, and he processes those words. She wants him. The woman who hates him most in the world wants him, and he doesn’t know how or why it’s happened, but it has, and that?  _

_ It is, perhaps, the greatest feeling in the entire world.  _

_ Compulsion of a magical sort pulling him forward finger pushes a little further inside of her, and in response, she gives him a moan he knows will echo through his mind on the longest of his nights to come regardless of what happens here. Even if she pulls away two seconds from now and they both come to their senses, he will never forget that beautiful, wonderful sound for as long as he lives.  _

_ A fresh coat of wetness covers the finger he has inside of her, and a new thought enters his head. Slowly, he removes his hand from her cunt, bringing his finger up to his lips as their eyes lock once more, remaining focused solely on each other as he puts his finger in his mouth, and slowly licks and sucks the taste of her from his skin.  _

_ She shivers as she watches, her hand wrapping over his as he pulls his finger from his lips. “Ben…” _

_ “Let me taste you,” he says, practically begging as he speaks. “Please, your grace.” _

_ Her tongue comes out to wet her lips, and a tense moment passes as she seems to make an attempt to think it over, but he knows, they both know that she’s made up her mind. She made it up before he’d even finished speaking.  _

_ Therefore, it is no surprise when she finally nods, and he sighs as she says, “Yes.” And he is free to continue his stream of kisses down her neck onto her chest, kissing her breasts through the layer of fabric as she moans softly beneath him, and his mind goes dizzy with thoughts of tasting her again.  _

_ * _

What does he want? There are so many things he wants, so many things he will never have, but she didn’t ask for those, and he wants something she can actually give him. 

One answer will suffice, just one, and maybe then he can have some peace of mind. 

“I want you to look me in the eyes, and tell me you haven’t thought about it every day since it happened.” He tightens the grip on her wrist ever so slightly, but not so much so that he’s hurting her, just enough to let her know he’s there. “Tell me you want to forget it, then I’ll leave it alone. We won’t even consummate our marriage if you don’t want to.”

Swallowing, she looks up into his eyes, and that alone sends images into his brain, making him want to turn them both around and pin her to the nearest tree, kissing her again until they’re both dizzy. It strikes him that they’re in a very similar situation to the year before, arguing to a tense point, until both of them know the only place to go from here is to snap and relieve the tension, but now? He’s no longer sure where they’re going to end up this time. 

“I don’t think about it,” she replies, but there’s the slightest tremor in her voice as she speaks. “I haven’t thought about you since the carriage dropped me off at my family’s house in town and I redid my hair as quickly as I could manage under the cherry tree behind the gazebo.”

Quirking an eyebrow, he almost laughs. “You haven’t?”

“Not even once.” This time, her voice is a growl, as if she’s trying to make it more serious, more severe, but he can still hear the faintest traces of that tremor, and he knows instantly that he is being told a false truth. 

Leaning in close, he hovers in her space, his breath ghosting over her lips as his eyes close, as if he’s about to kiss her. Instead, the corners of his lips twitch into what almost resembles a smile, and he whispers one word against her lips, just one. “ _ Liar _ .”

His fiancé doesn’t hesitate to respond. She rugs on the hand that’s gripping hers, using his grip on her against him as she whirls them around, and the world spins violently around them as he suddenly feels the tug of gravity, then everything is—

Wet. Everything is wet. He is drenched, soaked to the bone, his entire body coated in a layer of fairly slimy, cold pond water as he lands with an enormous splash, and he can barely breathe for a couple of seconds as his head dips beneath the water. It takes a few seconds before he can get his bearings, before his palms find the muddy, gritty bottom of the pond, and he pushes himself into a sitting position. 

As the water begins to wash away from his eyes, he wipes the remainder of it free with his left hand, running it through his now damp hair as he looks up at the Duchess who is staring down at him horrified. Her hands are overlapping over her mouth, palms directly over her pink lips, concealing them from view as her fingers bunch up worriedly on either side of her nose. Regret is plain as day in her gaze, her entire body rigid as she looks down at him in horror. “Your highness, forgive me, I’m so—“ She uncovers her mouth, shaking her head fervently as she approaches the edge of the pond, her pink skirts flowing in the breeze as she nears. “I’m so sorry, I don’t know what came over me. I wasn’t thinking I—“

“I don’t care,” he grumbles, holding out a hand for her. “Help me out.”

Nodding hurriedly, Rey moves forward, picking up her skirts with one hand as she reaches out with the other, kneeling slightly as she leans in, and her hand comes forth to meet his. “I’m so sorry.” 

It’s not enough, though. She’s activated something within him that yearns for revenge, payback, and so when her hand meets his, when white satin makes contact with his bare palm, he doesn’t hesitate. The second his hand grips hers, he pulls, tugging her into the water with him. 

Rey goes down with a shriek, the splash from the impact soaking him anew, and he gasps slightly as her hand comes down to land on his shoulder, gripping it firmly as she stops her head from going under. Unlike him, she’s lucky enough to avoid looking like a drowned rat—he hasn’t glimpsed his reflection, but he’s certain with the way his hair drips water into his eyes that he looks like one—her three buns still intact.

The only thing that has been ruined is her dress, which is a shame, since it was rather pretty, but it is not his problem. 

“What the  _ hell _ , Ben?” she cries, splashing water at him as she pushes herself into a standing position. “What did you do that for?”

“You pushed me first!” he protests, then he too stands up—on his own this time, since she has proven to him that she cannot be trusted. “What did  _ you  _ do  _ that  _ for, huh?”

“You were being an arrogant, spiteful ass!” The Duchess kicks another wave of water his way, nearly knocking herself off balance in the process. She regains her footing quickly, stepping out of the bond before she bends back down, and begins wafting through the water again. “And now you’ve cost me my shoe!”

“Well, you cost me my dignity, so I suppose we’re even, your grace.” 

Scoffing, she gives a brief laugh of pure glee as she pulls her shoe free from the pond, then she points it in his direction. The motion, however, is swift, and as a result, a few drops of wet, unexpectedly warm mud, splatter on his face, and he grunts his annoyance as she continues pointing the toe of it his way. “I almost find it charming that you think you had any dignity in the first place!”

“And I feel the same for you, it is almost charming that you think you have any. Perhaps if you did you wouldn’t be pushing princes into ponds.”

“You are so full of yourself, aren’t you?”

“At least I’m not a liar,” he growls, stepping out of the pond as she glares at him. “At least I can admit that maybe for a second, I saw something, I saw a potential for a day when we might not hate each other. You denied it, you denied all of it, and now?” He steps closer, invading her space as she cranes her neck to meet his eyes. “Now maybe we do have a reason to hate each other.”

Her lower lip quivers, and his eyes become drawn to it immediately, captivated by that pink, shivering lip as it betrays everything she’s thinking. “Maybe we do.” And,  _ oh,  _ she’s a terrible liar, but he has already tried taking the truth from her. He can’t do it again, he doesn’t want to be pushed into a pond a second time. 

“Being married to you is going to be the most miserable version of existence I can possibly imagine.”

“For once, your highness, we are in agreement.” 

They fall silent after that, both of them staring at one another as their chests heave, their skin glistening with wetness as the water shines in the sunlight. He wonders if his cheeks are flushed like hers, if he’s pink and blushing like a schoolboy, if he is colored by his anger, his rage, and the underlying feeling that’s been boiling beneath his skin for the past year. 

Closing his eyes again, he steps forward, and listens to the sound of the wind as it rustles the leaves around them, tree branches swaying gently so they tap against one another as birds chirp and fly between them. Like the lake, he can hear the water lapping gently at the shores of the pond, and somewhere in the distance, the hooves of a horse pound the soil as someone rides into or maybe out of the castle. Their breathing is the last thing he can hear, both of them still almost panting as they stand together like this, as if they’ve somehow mutually agreed to calm down, and back off from the heat of their argument. 

“We’ll have to go back,” he says after a while. 

“I know.”

“They’ll see us like this.”

“I know that, too.”

“What do we do?”

Taking in a deep breath, she crosses her arms over her chest, and tilts her chin up. “We tell them… you fell in and I also fell in helping you.”

“It isn’t quite the truth.”

“Yes, well, my grandfather and your mother will never let us hear the end of it if they learn it,” Rey says, then she smooths out a wrinkle on her ruined dress as if that will somehow fix the problem. 

“I’m sure my mother will have something you can wear.”

“Good.”

“Great.”

“Fantastic.”

“Can we please just go?”

Nodding, she waits for him to hold out his arm again, then she takes it, and they resume the awkward silence they’d had at the beginning of their talk, making their way back towards the castle as they try to cool off from the argument, both knowing full well this ordeal is far from over. 


	3. Set Date

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter count went up by one and might go up more cause we do still have a month and a half before that wedding 👀

His mother, of course, is far more intuitive than he wants her to be. The minute he gets home that afternoon, he never quite manages to make it to his chambers once he and Rey part ways. The Queen of Alderaan finds him first. 

And Leia Organa has always had incredible intuition. 

Ben spills his guts as if he’s been cut open, and he’s ordered to reconcile with Rey immediately. Telling his mother they had already settled the matter—well, sort of, but she doesn’t need to know that—does little to aid his cause. He has another meeting with his new fiancé next week, and he groans every time he thinks about it. 

All that does, however, is force his mother’s hand, and she plays it a few days later. 

“You have to pull yourself together, Ben,” she tells him, pacing about the library as he attempts to ignore her, burying his nose in a fascinating book on the theory of evolution. Well, it’s fascinating when his mother is chastising him for arguing with the same woman he’s been arguing for the better part of a decade. “You can not pull your fiancé into a pond just because you’re angry with her!”

“She pushed me first!”

That was the wrong thing to say. He knows it instantly from the rage he can see in his mother’s eyes. Were he still a boy, she probably would’ve smacked him. She still might, he thinks. “Ben, you have to be better than that. You’re the Prince, you’re the heir to _my_ throne. When I pass it on to you, I need to know that you have the maturity to run the country.” Putting her hands on her hips. “By shoving your fiancé into the pond—“

“After she pushed me first.”

“— _by shoving your fiancé into the pond,_ you have shown me you aren’t ready, and since you are now a man that concerns me. It concerns me greatly.”

Shaking his head, Ben sighs as he shuts the book he’s reading, and sets it down on the table beside the chair he’s been sitting in. “Mother, Rey and I have hated each other since we were children. You know this. We’re not friends.”

“Then you need to become friends, Ben,” His mother all but hisses at him, leaning over his chair in a way that makes him feel at least two feet shorter. His mother is dwarfed by him in height, but with him sitting down and her being, well, herself, he feels like a small child again. That little boy that’s been resting inside of him for so long comes back to life, and he finds himself struggling to keep his face straight. 

Something in him must be coming to the surface, something in the way his eyes become downcast and his mouth shifts become tells, and suddenly his mother backs away, her arms falling to her sides as she cocks her head ever so slightly to the side. “What aren’t you telling me?”

 _Oh no._ This can’t happen. He can’t let her know _this._ “It’s nothing. Just… I don’t know how we can ever become friends after…” Shaking his head, he meets his mother’s eyes, and lowers his voice. “What do you want me to do?”

She doesn’t believe him, he can see it in his eyes that she doesn’t believe him, but he doesn’t care. She’ll press him about it, he knows, but he’s bought himself some time to think. “Apologize to Rey, and try to make amends,” his mother orders him. “Or I’ll move up the wedding date and you’ll be stuck together that much sooner.”

That forces him to his feet. “What?”

“You heard me. I need you to grow up and act like the man I know you can be, the _leader_ I know you can be.”

“Mother—“

“Don’t ‘mother’ me, Ben,” his mother growls, and though she is now shorter than him, he still feels small in front of her. “Do your part, apologize to that girl, and who knows? Maybe one day you’ll look at her and realize all the disdain meant something else.”

Before he can get another word out, his mother gives him the stare that could shut him up from across the room, and walks away, her shoes clicking softly on the tile behind her as she leaves, and he finds himself alone in the library with his thoughts. 

He has no idea how he’s going to make things right with Rey. His fiancé currently has no interest in repairing things between them, since they both know the fastest way to do so would be to discuss and open up about what happened last year and that isn’t going to happen, they aren’t going to make this better anytime soon. 

An exasperated sigh escapes him, then he puts his hand on the back of his chair, and turns around, looking out the window onto the pond he and Rey had forced each other into the week before. He has no idea how he is going to fix this, there isn’t anything he can think of that his fiancé will agree to that will prevent them from having to get married any sooner, but he knows they have to, so what can they do?

 _You could fake it_ , a tiny voice in his head whispers. _Pretend everything is fine. Rey will agree to that, won’t she?_

It’s a good plan, perhaps the best he’s come up with thus far, but he thinks it’s not enough. There’s only so much pretending he can do. Surely, at some point they will break, they will both snap and the truth will come out, won’t it?

He hopes, he prays that someday it’ll change, because to live like this, to pretend that the day they spent by the lake isn’t one he looks back on fondly would be a false existence he can’t picture himself living. Not for long, at least. 

*

A few days later, a month and a half before their wedding, he finds himself riding through the woods on the back of a stallion with a coat as black as the night. Beside him, two more riders rush like the wind through the woods, all three of them galloping as if they’re running from something. 

Well, Ben is running from something. The two men beside him—knights of his. Poe Dameron and Armitage Hux—are just following his lead as they always do. Knights of Alderaan are loyal, especially to their commander, and while that commander may technically be his mother, they’re closer in age to the Prince. 

They are _friends_ with him, even if they are supposed to be following someone else’s commands. 

As they approach the lake, Ben slows his horse, his focus unsteady as he realizes they’re approaching the lake from the year before, and he feels his breathing shudder when he lays his eyes on the oak tree he and Rey defiled each other beneath. It’s been so long since he’s been here, since he’s had the courage to look at it, but his horse needs water, and if fate has decreed he must drink here, then he can’t stop it. 

“Your highness?” Poe’s voice asks to the right of him, and he turns his head a bit too slowly as he gives him his attention. “Are we stopping here?”

“My horse needs water,” he replies, then he grips the reins in one hand, and swings one leg over the back of the horse as he climbs down. 

Armitage looks over to Poe from his position atop his horse, both Ben seeming to exchange words without saying anything as they look at one another. “Dismount?” 

“Dismount,” Poe repeats, then both of his knights work to get back on their feet, and the three of them walk up to the water’s edge. 

Try as he might, Ben can't ignore that tree as they walk past it, he can’t stop seeing Rey, disheveled and debauched beneath him, her breast fallen free from her dress and her hair loose from those buns. His mind keeps going back to it, his body longing for hers, to hold her and touch her again, and he knows, has always known, that he is fucked. 

*

_She practically howls when he puts his mouth on her. When his tongue comes out from between his lips and strokes gently from her entrance to her clit, Rey cries out his name, the sound long and deep. His cock twitches in his pants in response, eager to respond to the command for more, for him._

_He can’t give her that, not yet. He has to prepare her first, he knows. It’s a fact learned in a book his mother had tried to hide in their extensive library that’s full of all sorts of facts about what they’re doing beneath this tree. This act, which, according to the rules of society and most religious holy books, is supposed to be reserved for marriage, but he knows most people break that rule anyway._

_Still, he’s shocked that he’s becoming one of those people. Especially with the woman he’s only ever known as an enemy._

_“Fuck, Ben, that feels so good,” Rey breathes, her fingers tugging at his hair as she whispers words that will get them sent to hell but sound like music to his ears._

_He hums against her clit, and she whimpers beneath him, the heels hooked around his shoulders dig into his back, pulling him closer until he feels like he’s a part of her as he slips his tongue in her entrance. She tastes like nothing he’s ever had before, but he supposes that makes sense since he’s never done this with anyone else._

_At first, he isn’t sure how he feels about the taste. Most of his joy with this act comes from the response he gets out of her anyway, since it’s much more fun than the yelling they engage in during their arguments. Perhaps this is how things will be from now on, perhaps now they’ll settle their debates with his head between her thighs. It’s a pleasant mental image, one he likes very much to think about as his tongue flicks at her clit, then he sucks it between his lips._

_Normally she tells him how much she hates his mouth because of how much he never shuts it. Today, she is thriving beneath its touched her body reacting to his in a way he’s never seen before, and as her fingers stroke through his hair, as they hold him close. “Ben…”_

_“Shh, I’ve got you,” he whispers against her, his fingers digging into the muscles of her thighs to keep her grounded as she barely resists grinding her hips into his face. “I’ve got you.”_

_Time begins to pass, his lips and tongue continuing in their elegant but unpracticed torture as they work to bring her closer and closer to where he needs her to be. Eventually, she’s a whimpering mess beneath him, her voice hoarse as she moans his name, and finally, gives him that beautiful warning he’s been needing to hear all along._

_“Ben I’m close,” she whispers, and he thinks he could die happy like this, could give his life and die just like this with his head between her thighs and her on the edge of coming undone. This is how he wants to die. This, right here, is perfection, and he revels in it for another few seconds before he knows she needs to come, and so he forces himself to stop sucking on her clit for a moment, and look into her eyes._

_She looks pissed for a couple of seconds, but then he smirks, and she sighs as he presses another open-mouthed kiss to her cunt. “Come for me, Rey,” he replies, and she does, she comes with a sharp cry and her thighs grip his head so tight he almost feels like he’s in pain, but those sweet, sweet noises she’s making make everything worth it._

_He will suffer this pain a thousand times just to hear her say his name like that again._

*

In the present, his horse is casually lapping at the lake water, his eyes caught on the hills on the far side of the lake as the sunlight shimmers off of its surface in a manner that’s blinding when looked at head on. His thoughts, however, leave him unfocused, and so it takes him several minutes to realize he’s been staring into that blinding light. By the time he notices, it pains him to look away, causing his companions to laugh as they watch him cry out. 

“I saw that coming,” Hux mutters, his voice quiet as he leans over in Poe’s direction. 

“What’s taken your wit, Ben?” Poe asks. “You’ve been acting weird for days.”

“It’s nothing.” 

The red-haired knight simply laughs, and walks around to the side of his horse that's closest to Ben. “It isn’t nothing. You’ve been off and aloof for days now ever since your birthday. Even then it was… peculiar.”

“It’s your fiancé, isn’t it?” Poe stares at him curiously as he says it, as if he already knows the truth but is waiting for that final confirmation. “We know you have a bit of a history with Rey.”

A frown crosses his face. “You do?”

“You’ve ‘hated’ each other since you were teenagers and now you’re engaged to be married.”

Something about the way Poe says the word “hated,” makes Ben pause. Yes, this statement means his knight doesn’t know what transpired beneath this very oak tree a year ago, but he does know something, more than he should. More than the prince wants him to. 

He has to know what that means, however awkward the ensuing conversation will be. 

“Yes, we have, and yes, that makes it more difficult, but what’s between us is unmistakably animosity,” he says, quirking an eyebrow as he glances at Poe. “Your tone suggests it’s something else entirely.”

“It does, but with all due respect, your highness, it’s up to you to figure it out,” Poe replies as his horse finishes drinking, and raises its head towards the midday sun. “It is not me to tell you.”

“Nor I.” Armitage’s horse is also finished, its head leveling with the others as he speaks. “However, I find it interesting that you claim to loathe her and yet anyone with eyes can see that she is consistently on your mind.”

“She means nothing,” Ben insists, causing the two knights to look at one another knowingly as he climbs back on his horse, the last of the three to finish his drink. “It is simply an arrangement between Jakku and Alderaan. Nothing more. I loathe Rey, and Rey loathes me.”

Even as he says it, speaks the only truth he’s ever known, it feels like a lie. It feels dirty and cheap coming from his lips, and a slight hint of nausea pass through him as he settles into the back of his horse. 

“They do say loathing is quite easy to misinterpret,” Armitage mutters, then both he and Poe share a laugh, the latter of the two looking back at the Prince as they chuckle at his expense. “But it matters not, we should be returning to the castle before the day progresses any further. They say we’re due for a storm in the coming hours.” 

The other knight hums his agreement. “I’d hate to be caught in it. Should we go, your highness?”

“Yes,” he replies, his voice still distant, his thoughts still clouded by his fiancé. “We should.” Then with a nudge into his horse’s side, he’s turning them around, and they’re racing down the path once more, leaving the oak tree and his memories of Rey behind them as they head toward the distant grey clouds on the horizon, and he hears for the first time the roll of far away thunder. 

*

The next three days are the stormiest he’s ever seen. In Ben’s twenty-one years, he has never seen lightning so bright or heard thunder so powerful that it shakes the ground with every wave. He shivers in his room each time it happens as he sits down at the writing desk at the far side of his quarters, a fountain pen crafting a perfect calligraphic script over parchment as he writes a letter to his fiancé. 

It’s not really a letter so much as it is a summons, but nonetheless, he feels it is of the utmost importance that he write it to her immediately, lest his mother make good on her promise to wed them sooner rather than later. And really, he is tired of the fighting. Surely Rey must be too even if she intends to deny what happened last summer?

He has no way of knowing, but he still intends to invite her to spend a day with him, to show her the castle properly in a way she’s never seen it. Or perhaps he’ll just take her to the library and they’ll read in silence. It may just be that simple. 

Or… he faintly recalls his mother mentioning a dinner party sometime in the last few days, one that would take place at a nearby house of one of Alderaan’s noble families. Poe had mentioned it, too, he thinks, recalling that he’d said a friend of his would be in attendance and he wanted to inquire about his well being. What family was it again? The Tico’s? 

Dear Rey,

  
As you are aware, the situation between us has grown far too intense for either of us to handle. The way we behave around one another is unfitting of two people of our station, and given our impending marriage, we need to find a way to be civil with one another.

  
I’m writing to ask if you are willing to at least pretend not to loathe me in public. I will do the same, but if we cannot manage to convince my mother that we are getting along, we will be forced to wed that much sooner. 

  
It is with this in mind that I humbly invite you to attend the Tico’s dinner party on this Friday evening. I believe that a public function will force us to cooperate with one another, and if I recall correctly, you and Rose Tico, the youngest daughter of the family, are well acquainted with one another. I believe the party will be a good opportunity for us to speak with one another and learn to handle our arguments in a civilized manner, which we must do in order to marry. 

  
I hope you accept, I truly believe we both could benefit from this. 

  
~~Love~~ ,

  
Best regards,

  
Your fiancé, Ben. 

He thinks the letter will be enough. He hopes and prays that the letter will be enough. All he wants, all he has wanted since that day they spent together is to try and make things right, to get a chance to speak with her and try to get her to stop running from this. To stop hating him so he can stop hating her. 

After viewing the letter no less than seventy-two times, Ben folds it up, and seals it in an envelope, which he then shuts with the royal seal of Alderaan, red ink spilling out over the paper before he stamps down on it. Once it’s done, he leaves the note by his desk for one of the attendants to take in the morning and send it through the mail. 

Left with nothing else to do, he looks out the window, watching the wind beat the rain against his window, lightning illuminating the distant trees over by the hill. The ensuing thunder shakes the ground as he stands, wrapping his dressing-gown a little more tightly around himself as he turns off the lantern, and makes his way toward his bed, unsure why his hands are shaking. 

Perhaps it’s because, as much as he wants to deny it, he doesn’t hate her. Rey riles him up and makes him mad and argues with him like she was professionally trained to do so, but he doesn’t hate her. Those negative feelings he carries for her sometimes exist in a state of flux, they ebb and fade with every chance he has to calm down. He doesn’t hate her, she just has a habit of pressing every button he has. 

Shaking his head, he pulls back his sheets, and slips inside, closing his eyes as he tries in vain to sleep through the rest of the storm. 

That night, of course, he does not get one minute of sleep, not even a second, and he can’t even blame the thunder. 

*

_The carriage ride back from the lake passes them by in perfect silence. There isn’t a single word spoken between them, neither of them knowing what to say, and he can’t speak for Rey, but he knows he can’t stop thinking about her like that, spread out on the blanket beneath him as they ignored their food, and got to know each other in the most intimate way possible._

_His tongue darts out to lick his lower lip, his body shuddering as he realizes he can still taste her, can still feel her hands on his body, in his hair. Parts of his scalp still sting and burn from how hard she’d tugged on his hair, his neck—and hers upon further inspection—is covered in marks she’d left on him, his body marked by her kisses._

_And hers by his._

_They both currently bear the scars of what they’ve just done even if they’re trying to deny it. He adjusts the collar of his coat, concealing the hickeys from view as the carriage rocks gently over the road back to his home._

_A similar action is taken by the woman in the carriage with him. The Duchess adjusts the collar, her cheeks flushed not with shame, but something else he doesn’t dare let himself hope to see. She clearly doesn’t want this, so why should he believe it means anything? She doesn’t want to address this. They’d established this was a fluke, a moment of weakness._

_So why does that feel so wrong? Why, as they sit here in silence, does he want to surge forward and kiss her again? To rattle the carriage further as they made their way back?_

_The Duchess had said this meant nothing, but to him at least, it means everything. A thought pops into his head that if he could learn to love her, perhaps his parents won’t force his hand next year when he’s twenty-one. Perhaps he could marry someone who isn’t a complete stranger._

_It’s doubtful, however, that she would ever agree to such an arrangement._

_The carriage pulls up to the front of the house, and he soon finds himself opening the door, and stepping out. All thoughts of marriage flee his mind as he turns around, and holds out his hand for her._

_She looks at it apprehensively for a couple of seconds, then she reaches out, and white satin meets his bare palms, both of them hovering delicately around each other for a couple of seconds before they finally touch, and her fingers grasp his. Both of them shudder at the contact, their eyes locking as he helps her down, and though only two seconds must pass, he feels a lifetime older. So much seems to happen in those two seconds, so much that neither of them can really contemplate or truly grasp the meaning of._

_Ben thinks for a fraction of a second that maybe she’s thinking the same thing he is, that maybe she’s thinking they don’t have to go back to what they were before. That split-second, however, passes like a fleeting shadow. Her eyes quickly resume the loathing that they’ve always carried for him, and he knows that things aren’t going to change, that this was, as she had said, a fluke._

_The thought saddens him, but he doesn’t dwell on it as he continues to help her out of the carriage._

_“Thank you, your highness,” she says, then she lets go of his hand and the loss of her warmth leaves him feeling cold. You shouldn’t feel cold he should feel fine, he should feel normal, but he doesn’t. He feels off, distant, like he’s in some alternate reality, like something out of the books he reads in his mother’s library._

_“You’re welcome, your grace,“ He says, then he steps back, and looks up at the castle not wanting to go inside. He’s not ready to give up just yet. “Rey…”_

_“Don’t,” she warns him. “Let us never speak of this again, as I said earlier, this was a fluke, and we can never tell anyone.”_

_Nodding his steps back, and lets her walk forward without him. Yet he watches her go, fascinated by what she’s just said to him, fascinated by the looks they exchanged, the feelings that I’ve passed between them, and how she can just ignore that. He wishes it was that easy, though perhaps she is also pretending as he now must. He hates it, he hates it with every piece of his soul, but he knows what he must do. It’s what they both must do._

_If anyone were to find out what had happened between them while they were unwed, they would be crucified by society or at least Rey would be. He can’t ruin her like that, so he keeps a secret, he locks it up inside of him, and he pretends that that afternoon, all that happened between them was a picnic and a few barbs, followed by silence._

_*_

Rey’s letter comes a few days later. Ben is once again in the library reading up on a different string of science, learning about atoms and chemistry, and his mother of all people, walks into the room and tells him he has a letter from Rey with a knowing look on her face. Not sure what the knowing look means, he takes the letter from her and begins to open it as she leaves, trying to keep his heart from racing as he reads what it says.

Dear Ben, 

  
I am writing to say that I accept your invitation. Rose Tico is indeed a dear friend of mine, and I have been searching for a reason to leave the manor in which I am currently residing and visit her. At the bare minimum, this party would be a wonderful excuse to do so, even if I must spend an evening on your arm. 

  
I agree we need to work on at least pretending to like each other, and I don’t wish to be married to you any sooner either. 

  
If I may I would like to suggest that we ride in the same carriage to suggest to people that we are agreeable with one another. 

  
Also, I would like to apologize for my actions by your pond last week. I never should have pushed you in, nor should I have claimed that you had no dignity, I apologize for my part in that encounter, and hope that soon you will do the same. I regret to say that I am embarrassed by my actions and mortified to have done such a thing. It was something that never should have happened, and for that I am sorry. 

  
I hope all is well.

  
Sincerely,

  
Rey. 

He folds the letter once he’s done reading it, surprise crossing his features as he sets it down, then stands to stare out the window, his hands folding behind his back as he approaches, thinking over what she’d just written. 

His fiancé has apologized for pushing him into the pond, something he never thought he’d see from her, and yet, it happened. The impossible has happened, and he starts to wonder if it’s the beginning of a new phase in their relationship, a turning point in which they finally find themselves moving past all of the petty things they’ve been doing to one another since they were teenagers. It may be too much to hope for, but still, he thinks it might be a start. 

“What did she say?” his mother’s voice asks from somewhere behind him, and he jumps from the shock of hearing it, even though it’s rather gentle. 

Placing a hand over his chest as if it will calm his racing heart, he sighs. “By God, mother, you should make more noise when you enter a room.”

“Don’t avoid the question, Ben,” his mother replies, then he watches as she tilts her chin up, and he feels, yet again, as if he is a mere three inches tall. “What did she say?”

Looking down at the ground, Ben shuffles awkwardly on his feet for a couple of seconds before he musters up the courage to make eye contact with her. “She told me she has accepted my invitation to the Tico’s dinner party, and even suggested we ride in the same carriage.”

“Well, that is generous of her. Do you plan to?”

“Of course, she is my fiancé, mother, it’s only appropriate that we arrive together.”

“Yes, it is.” A pause, then her eyes narrowed suspiciously, as if she thought he was hiding something, and she stepped forward, the fabric of her gown rustling as she moved. “Did she say anything else?”

“Only an apology for what happened when we last saw each other.”

“Ah, good, perhaps she’s come round. You ought to work on doing the same.”

“I am the one who wrote to her to suggest we attend the dinner party together,” he protests, stepping closer to his mother as she continues to give him that slightly disappointed and confused state. 

“Yes, and that was wonderful, but you can always do more, Ben. Be good to her.”

“I’m trying,” he whispers, then he makes his way from the room, deciding to wander the halls for the time being as his mind continues to spin from Rey’s letter and the hope he doesn’t dare allow to take root in his mind. They have both made up their minds—or she has and he did so in turn—and while things may appear to be improving, he doesn’t dare believe that any change is actually permanent. 


	4. Evening Ride

The party rolls around sooner than he wants it to. Before he knows it, he’s standing in front of a mirror in a suit hued a deep purple, black accents lining the edges and embroidery, but the difference between the two colors is so subtle, it only appears when it’s caught in the light. It’s an old suit of his father’s, according to his mother, and it had been trapped in a wardrobe for many, many years since before Ben was born. 

Apparently, the time for it to see daylight once more was right now. 

He’s rolling up the sleeves slightly, making sure his cufflinks are in place, when his mother pokes her head into his bedroom door, and he fights back the urge to roll his eyes. “What is it?”

There’s a certain grace to the way his mother walks. She is the Queen of Alderaan, so it makes sense that she would carry herself tall and with poise, but today, she carries herself with purpose as well. “The carriage is ready, I was just making sure you were.”

“Of course I’m ready, mother.” He adjusts his second cuff link. “I’m always punctual.”

“Yes, well, I know you haven’t exactly been looking forward to this.” Placing a hand on his shoulder, she stops Ben in his actions, and he slowly turns to look down at her and away from the mirror as her eyes grow weary. “Please behave yourself. I know you said things were improving, but in the event that they haven’t improved as much as you say, please—“

“I know, mother,” he says, placing a hand over hers and patting it gently before he leans forward to plant a tiny kiss on his mother’s forehead. “I will.”

“Has she written to you about anything else since her acceptance of your invitation?” There’s hope in her voice, a hope that reminds him of how he’d felt the past week waiting for her to somehow address their summer dalliance in their correspondence they’ve had to arrange the details of this evening. He’s been hoping for things to change, and yet her tone in her letters remains as cordial and professional as ever. 

If Rey is ever going to acknowledge and converse with him on the subject of the oak tree, it will not be over a letter. 

“No, I haven’t heard anything else,” he admits, then he shakes his head. “All our letters lately have been strictly to arrange details.”

“I see.” The Queen tilts her head up slightly. “But they haven’t been—?”

“ _ Mother. _ ”

“I’m only looking out for you, Ben. The situation isn’t ideal, but that doesn’t mean I want you to be miserable.”

Scoffing, Ben points in the direction of the hall. “I’m going to go.”

“Ben—“

“Mother, I won’t make Rey anymore inclined to marry me if I arrive at her home late,” he replies, then his mother’s mouth closes, and she gives a small bow of her head to acknowledge her agreement. Giving her a small twitch of his lips into a smile, he reaches out for the doorknob, and the two of them make their way into the halls. 

*

Perhaps the most apt description for Ben’s behavior on the ride over to Rey’s home, is jittery. The entire time, he is on edge, he feels as if he is about to jump out of his own skin at any second. Hell, he might try to completely voluntarily. He isn’t sure why he is so nervous, he’s handled encounters with Rey before, but tonight, his sole purpose is to spend time with her, to rectify some of the damage done between them. 

He thought terrifies him more than anything he has ever done before.

As a prince, Ben knows he should be standing tall and proud – well, technically he is sitting tall and proud, but the point still stands – but for some reason he cannot gather together his courage, nor his wit. The carriage rolls through the countryside, the gravel beneath the wheels creating a rickety sort of noise that haunts him like the beating of his own heart. Outside, the world is fairly dark, and he cannot see much aside from lanterns, and the occasional glistening of the moon off of the surface of the water of the lake. The picture it creates is a haunting one, almost foreboding, and  _ God _ , He needs to get a hold of himself, but he finds it difficult to contain the anxiety welling within him.

What if this evening goes wrong in every way he thinks it well? What if nothing goes as planned? What if he and Rey get into some sort of argument and just wind up hating each other even more than they already do?

It’s an endless cycle of fear that he has entered and as the carriage rollers up to Ray’s house, he finally managed to pull himself together, and sit up straight and tall just as he supposed to. The gravel stops rocking so violently beneath him, everything starts to go quiet,, and he can see her silhouette backlit by the lamps posted on either side of the front steps, her fingers clutching at a shawl she’s wrapped around her shoulders as she waits for him to arrive. 

From here, he can’t gauge her mood. There’s no way of telling if she’s as nervous as he is as the carriage pulls up in front of the steps, and so he must go about not knowing as he slowly reaches for the door handle to push it open, and do his gentlemanly duty of helping her inside. 

The first thought that passes through his mind as he opens the door and climbs down from the carriage is that she looks beautiful. Tonight, she’s wearing a pale lavender dress, the skirts embroidered with a slightly paler purple than the rest of the fabric that descends from the ribbon tied around her waist. The upper half of the dress is invisible to him thanks to the shawl, but as she moves forward to meet him, reaching out a hand for his, he catches the faintest glimpse of cleavage that sends a shudder through his body.

If she catches sight of it, she doesn’t say anything.

He takes her hand, white silk grasping his bare palm, but the fabric fails to hide how warm she is beneath it. Rey feels vaguely like standing in the sun on a warm day, he thinks, but it’s just a passing thought. There are more pressing matters at hand, such as getting them both inside of the carriage before she notices he’s just sat there staring at her for several seconds. 

Neither of them says anything beyond a nod of acknowledgment as he guides her toward the carriage, and she lifts her skirts with her free hand so she can step inside. His eyes wander briefly to her ass as she climbs in, thinking of how it felt to touch it before it disappears from view, and she sits on the bench opposite of the one he’d been sitting on, waiting patiently for him to climb in behind her. 

Keeping his silence, the prince pulls himself into the carriage, and closes the door behind him once he’s sitting. Seconds later, they both hear the sound of the driver snapping the reins, and with a neigh, the horses pulling them resume their trot, driving them away from the lights of Rey’s home and toward the Tico household, the sounds of the road rumbling beneath them and the hoofbeats of the horses filling their ears once more.

For a few seconds, they manage to distract themselves by staring out the window. They both seem to be following that same unspoken agreement they’d made a year ago when they’d taken that carriage ride out to the lake to say nothing to one another. 

After all, there isn’t anywhere for them to pull over and fuck their frustrations out of each other on this road. They don’t have a picnic basket this time. They don’t have an excuse of, “oh, driver, this is fine.” All they have is their time in his carriage and the half an hour to the Tico’s estate. 

Eventually, though, they both cave; or rather, Ben does. 

“You look lovely,” he says, because it’s true, she looks wonderful tonight, radiant even, but he doesn’t want to overdo it. There’s a politeness to him telling her she looks lovely--it’s probably even expected of him as her fiance--but as her enemy, he cannot tell her too much. 

“Thank you.” She smoothes out a wrinkle in her glove. “You look handsome.”

“A compliment? You flatter me, your grace.”

“Oh please, it’s only polite,” she protests, then she laughs. “We did say we’d try to pretend to like one another.” 

Right, pretend. That’s all this is, just pretend. It isn’t anything real. It never will be, it never will be anything but a mask, and isn’t that just a goddamn tragedy? They could be so much more, he thinks, but the animosity that has historically existed between them both just runs too deep. At least, it runs too deep for her to consider it ever-changing.

“Indeed, so what do to people who actually like each other talk about then, your grace?” He then looks at her with what he knows is a smirk on his face and a glint of mischief in his eye. 

In response, Rey shifts uncomfortably, Her ankles crossing over one another as she squirms ever so slightly where she sits. “I don’t know. I think they talk about the he weddi—weather.” Her face goes pale as she covers her mouth with a gloved hand, realizing her tiny slip and its meaning. “They talk about the weather.”

Blinking his surprise, amusement fills him as her cheeks turn pink, but he can feel his growing warm as well. “I suppose they talk about weddings as well, if they truly enjoy one another’s company.”

“The institution of marriage for people like us, though, is not designed around whether or not we like one another,” she reminds him, then she looks down at her gloved hands where they are grasping one another in her lap. “Notice how I don’t even have a ring.”

She’s right. There isn’t a ring on her finger yet, just a set date and an announcement to their kingdoms that they’ll be marrying within the next two months—though it’s closer to a month now. “I can get you one.” His voice falls soft then, and for a few moments all they can hear is the quiet rocking of the carriage over the road. “My mother has an old ring she got from her parents. I think she wanted to give it to me one day. She always used to hope I’d find someone before the clock ran out, used to tell me stories and fill my head with fantasies of what this would be like.”

Looking at him curiously, Rey removes her hand from her lap, and settles it on the windowsill beside her. “Why didn’t you?”

“Why didn’t I what?”

“Find anyone. You had ample opportunity to find some other woman to marry rather than running down that clock and saddling yourself with me,” she points out, a shadow passing over her face in time with her eyes wandering to the ground. “Why didn’t you marry anyone else?”

Another pause fills the void between them then, and he breathes loudly, deeply as he tries to come up with an answer, as if he’s coming down from the adrenaline high that comes with a morning jog. All he’s done, though, is begin to think through his answer to a question that should be simple, but he finds is overwhelmingly complicated. 

Twenty-one years. That’s how long he had to find someone. To his credit, he was a child for most of those years, but even in those last few years of teenagerhood, he could’ve found someone, couldn't he? 

“I never found the right person,” he mutters in the end, the truth leaving his lips before his mind has the chance to stop it. “I just—I never met someone that I looked at and said—“ Gasping slightly, he manages a laugh in between words, mocking himself. “‘Oh, there you are.’ There was never anyone whose eyes I met and I thought, ‘I’d like to sweep you off your feet, I’d like to put a crown on your head and rule this kingdom together.’ No one made me realize I wanted to see them old and gray, or…”

His voice trails off, and he looks up to find Rey staring at him, her hazel eyes illuminated by a lamp as they pass it, a gold shimmer catching his gaze. “You’ve never been in love before.”

It’s plain, short, and simple, and it lays out his problem perfectly, but he wishes it didn’t. 

“I haven’t, but it shouldn’t have mattered.” He shifts where he’s sitting, leaning forward over the space between them as he speaks. The corners of his mouth twitch ever so slightly as he sees her do the same. If anyone were to look into the window, they would see their faces leaning out into the space between benches, their eyes locked solely on each other as he reveals his mistake to her. “It’s as you said, the institution of marriage for people like us should not involve love. We marry for alliances, for political gain. I let my heart get in the way, and now you are also suffering for it.”

This time, she is the one who is blinking in surprise, but she leans forward instead of backward, and tilts her head ever so slightly to the side, the shadow of those three buns she always wears just barely visible. “Is that an apology, Ben?”

“I believe people who like each other are capable of apologies, but if you’re insistent upon us both still playing pretend—“

A scoff leaves her lips, and she grits her teeth as she breathes deeply. “And here I was starting to think we were getting somewhere.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You almost apologize for forcing us into this situation because of your incapability to do your duty as a prince and then immediately backhand me by saying I insist on pretending when I ask you if you’ve just made an effort to say you’re sorry.” Then she shakes her head, her lip quivering slightly as she gathers herself, then his fiancé holds her head high. “You never change, do you? I was starting to think that perhaps you’d stop acting like a fool every time we talk, but you’ve proven me wrong yet again.”

“And you think you are so much better than me? I misspoke, your grace, and every time I do you scarcely give me the chance to apologize, and I think I know why.”

“Why?”

“Yes, I know why you never let me make any headway with you. I always shut down because of my own stubborn sense of pride, but you?” He points a finger at her, leaning even closer over the space between them as his face turns into a scowl. “You always hunt for an excuse to argue with me, to goad me into a fight so you can prove to yourself that I am a terrible person and you can have a reason to hate me.”

“That’s preposterous!” she cries, leaning closer to him as her eyes flicker down briefly to his lips, and he knows instantly that he is right. 

“No, it isn’t, because you don’t know how to feel about what happened between us last summer, and you’ve decided it would just be easier to hate me instead of giving me a chance to show you I’m good. You are  _ scared _ , Rey. You’re nothing more than just a scared little girl who—“

“Shut up—“

“Can’t admit her own—“

“ _ I said shut up! _ ” she shouts, then her fist wraps around his tie, and for a moment he thinks she’s going to slap him across the face, that her palm is going to strike his cheek because he has gone too far with his words, but of course, Rey has never been much for taking out her frustrations that wa—with the exception of when she pushed him in the pond.

Instead, she uses the grip she has on his tie to pull him close, and before he can get another word out, she’s kissing him again, and it’s just like it was last summer. She’d told him to shut up twice then and she’d done it now, and in hindsight, he understands it for what it is—she’s not telling him to stop talking because she doesn’t want to hear it. She’s telling him to shut up because it’s a  _ warning  _ of what she’s going to do to him if he doesn’t stop talking. 

Her kisses are a punishment, one that teases and taunts him with the potential it has. This is how she tells him what she’s thinking, this is how she refutes his argument, by the way she kisses him breathless in a matter of seconds, and as she crosses the space between them in the carriage. 

Said carriage, of course, hits a bump in the road as she rises to cross over to his side, and she gasps sharply as she falls into his lap, his hands coming up to support her immediately as he holds her close, and continues kissing her as an arm snakes around her waist, and his other hand lands half on her upper abdominal muscles and half on her chest. His fingers brush over the swell of one of her breasts, the tips of them skimming over the lace that covers her, but doesn’t fully conceal the hardness of her nipple beneath his palm. 

She wants him, he realizes. She claims to hate him, and maybe she does, but there is a part of her that wants him the way he’s wanted her ever since last year. The way she’s kissing him tells him everything he needs to know as he moans against her lips, and she shifts so that her legs are spread out on either side of him, so that she’s straddling him as she leans him back against the wall of the carriage, and he finds himself completely open as her tongue sweeps into his mouth. 

Her hands are already in his hair, silk meeting silk as she holds him close against her, seizing complete control of the kiss as he fights back the urge to whimper her name into the kiss. 

All he can do is kiss her back, meet her rhythm, and hold on tightly as she rolls her hips over him, his cock slowly coming alive as her kisses leave his lips, finding his jaw as he is finally free to breathe, to try and feed his starving lungs some oxygen. His blood is pumping through his veins faster than it ever has before as he whispers her name. “Your grace, we can’t—you can’t leave a mark, people will see.”

He wants her to leave a mark, he really does, but the unfortunate reality of their situation is that he can’t allow her to. If they get caught, if he is seen with some kind of bruise that tells people what they’ve just done, they’re both in trouble. 

“Let them see,” she says, then she grinds her hips over him again, and his eyes roll back in his head as they both moan. “Let them.”

“Ah— _ fuck _ —I’m afraid that’s not possible. You know what people will say—“

“I’m not marking you.” Her hips start moving faster over him, and as her lips brush over the column of his throat, he shudders, his hands gripping her a little more tightly as she sucks his skin into her mouth for a fraction of a second, then she releases him. “I’m passing the rest of this journey in the only way I can think will be pleasant for the both of us.”

She’s not wrong. It’s better than spending the rest of their ride together arguing, fighting with one another as if they’re playing a game neither of them can win. This is better, this is leagues better. 

“I agree.”

“Good, then stay quiet, or I’ll put my hand over your mouth and make you stay quiet,” she replies, then he gasps her name as she kisses him again, and his hips begin to move with hers. 

It’s not like what they did last summer. Not exactly. Back then she’d been beneath him, her hair sprawled out beneath him as he thrust into her and he saw the colors of her eyes shift beneath the dappled sunlight. Now they’re here, in the dark, the only light belonging to the half-moon and the occasional street lamp. 

This feels much more like a secret than it did when they were out in the open. This feels forbidden, properly forbidden, like it isn’t something they should be doing, and it isn’t, and that sends a thrill up his spine that he doesn’t have words for. 

It feels  _ good,  _ though,  _ really good.  _ The sensations coming up from his cock make his entire body feel like it’s buzzing as he kisses her, as she grinds a little harder and faster to pleasure him, to get  _ him  _ to fall apart. That’s not enough for him, though, just to come. He needs her to feel good, too. 

Maybe he wouldn’t ordinarily think that, but in circumstances like this he knows it’s the truth, and so he pulls her more tightly against him, the hand he has on her chest snaking up ever so slightly as he begins to circle her nipple through the fabric with his thumb, causing her to moan his name against his lips. “Fuck…”

A word so foul has never sounded so sexy, he thinks as he plays that word over again in his mind. His fingers continue their work, sinking beneath the low neckline of her dress as she loses focus on the kiss, every brush of her lips against his becoming stuttered, unhinged, uncontrolled, and he revels in it, making her lose the control she has over him. It’s like magic, the way she steadily reaches the edge under his touch, the way she whines against him as his fingers pinch her bare nipple between them, rubbing it gently as he fights the urge to tear that dress open and take her then and there. 

He wants her so badly, he wants to feel her come around him again—he’s missed the feeling so much since it last happened. Every day since he felt her come on his cock, he has thought about that feeling, thought about how hard it made him come in turn. To this day, he still hasn’t come as hard as he did after feeling it, his hand just doesn’t do it for him anymore. 

Apparently, though, it does it for her. She breaks the kiss, her eyes clenching shut as his open from the shock of her abrupt departure, and her forehead rests against his as she continues rocking her hips against him. His body suddenly becomes fully aware of everything that is happening, every tiny little feeling she’s bringing him, and he feels, even through the layers of their clothing, the tiniest little flutter as she comes apart on top of him— as she  _ comes _ on top of him. 

It’s just like last year, that same feeling he got then he’s reliving now, and it sends a fresh euphoria through the prince as he bucks up into her one last time, and though he knows he’s going to regret it, he comes in his pants. He comes harder than he has in a year, hard enough that stars fill his vision as he whispers her name, her title, and anything he can think to call her. Both of them are panting hard, whimpering against one another. They are both complete, utter messes as they start coming down from their highs, and the world slowly stops spinning. 

His chest is heaving as he removes his hand from her breast, as he covers it with the fabric of her dress once more, concealing the pale skin beneath the cool lavender. It’s a tragedy that he can no longer see her, but they have a lifetime ahead, a marriage to live through. He will see her chest again, he will see all of her bared above or beneath him someday, but right now, as the lights outside grow bright, he knows that time will not be coming as soon as he wants it to. 

“Your grace,” he breathes, taking in those eyes that haunt his dreams, watching them as they watch him, as if she’s trying desperately to figure out what he’s thinking. Little does she know that all she has to do is ask, and he will unfold his secrets as if he is an open book. 

Rey moves a hand down from his hair onto his cheek as her other hand smoothes down his tousled waves, making them look as though they haven’t been thoroughly sex tangled. “I didn’t mark you.”

“I know,” he says, then his eyes flutter shut as she leans in for one last kiss, his mind floating loosely in his skull as she kisses away the heat, soothing the burn of what’s just happened with a gentle touch as she runs her thumb over the skin of his cheek. 

Silk has never felt more soft to touch than it does right now when he’s being kissed like this, in this soft and almost intimate way, as if he’s not the object of her ire and hatred. It’s almost sweet, making him wonder if maybe, just maybe it means something. Is this a window into something more, or is he just reading too much into something small?

Then she pulls away, and the illusion shatters as she crawls off of him, leaving him to stare at her in wonder as the carriage draws closer to the house. “That’s quite enough of that,” she mutters as she sits down on her side of the carriage again. “Finish cleaning yourself up.”

“That’s it? We’re just going to pretend this didn’t happen?”

“We have to, don’t we? I didn’t mark you so no one would know.”

“I meant when we’re alone, Rey.”

“I know you did. I’m…” She looks back at him briefly, then she laughs. “It’s just easier.”

“To play pretend?” he asks, and she pauses, surely knowing she is caught. “To act as though you have never enjoyed my touch? To have never had your head spin from kissing me?”

“You—“ she starts, then she stops herself, looking up at him with what almost resembles  _ fear  _ in her eyes as she raises her chin. “We have a party to attend. Let’s just get through it and then we can address…” She gestures vaguely between them, then shakes her head. “Never mind. Maybe it is easier.”

“Rey—“

“Ben—“

At that moment, the carriage rolls to a stop, and he looks out the window to where the lights of the Tico house are shining down on them like a spotlight, the faint sound of music and chatter already trickling down into his ears. He looks back at her then, as the horses sputter and scoff, and he sighs, knowing their time is up. “Fine, we’ll just do what we promised. We’ll pretend.”

“Good,” she says, then she cocks her head to the side. “Then open the door and let’s go pretend to enjoy this party.”

He licks his lips, the taste of her still fresh on his tongue, then he sighs, and reaches for the door handle, pushing it open as they prepare to walk out and face the party, neither of them ready to leave that carriage but both knowing that they must do their duty. They cannot allow their hearts to lead them any longer.

After all, isn’t that how they got here in the first place?


	5. Dinner Party

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter count likely to go up again, stay tuned friends :D

The taste of her is still on his lips when they’re sitting down for dinner. It’s distracting him to the point that conversation is difficult, and no matter how much wine he drinks he can’t get the memory of it off his tongue. 

And the only place his lips have been is against hers. 

Eventually, it gets to the point where he excuses himself for a moment, claiming to feel faint, and makes his way to the toilet. He has to clean himself off anyway—his come has long since dried in his pants—so he hurries off out of the dining room, not stopping until he reaches the sink, at which point he braces himself against the porcelain, and breathes hard. 

His chest is heaving, his entire body shaking as if he’s drunk, but he’s only had a singular glass of wine. Sure, it is one of those fancy, alcohol heavy wines imported from Coruscant, but normally he can handle it. 

Tonight, he’s shaking for different reasons. As hard as he tries, he can’t shake the memory of Rey grinding on top of him in the carriage, the way her breast had felt beneath his hand or how it felt to have her tug on his hair again. He hadn’t been sure how this evening would go, but he certainly wasn’t expecting— _ that.  _

Even now as he grabs hold of the handkerchief in his pocket, wets it, and begins wiping furiously at the clothing he’s wearing, he still feels shaken at the memory of how she’d looked at him, how she’d touched him. He’s a mess of a man, he knows he is, but every time he closes his eyes his memory is flipping between a summer day beneath an oak tree and a dark night in a carriage. All of his thoughts are coming back to her and the way she makes him feel, and he’s realizing more and more with every day, every minute, every hour that passes, that something has changed. 

It’s been changing since that day last year, but now that they’ve come together again, it’s loud and clearer than it ever has been. There’s a passion between him and Rey that he’d thought was the culmination of all of the loathing between them, but with the way she kissed him, the way it’s both gentle and bruising all the same, he’s starting to see it’s something so much more than they both think it is. 

“Fuck,” he breathes, realizing that she probably hasn’t come to the same realization yet. Even if she has, she, like him, will never admit it. He might just be falling for someone who as far as he knows hates him. 

She believes what’s between them stems from loathing, and until recently, he’d thought he’d been mistaken too in thinking it could ever be anything but that. Now he sees it differently, and he feels as though he might actually faint as he’d told the others when he’d excused himself. 

_ What do I do? _ He thinks, feeling a panic well within him as he puts his handkerchief away, and looks at his reflection in the mirror. There’s no one but him there, no one but him to provide some sort of insight on where to go from here, and he’s frightened. Even if someone else were here, what would he say? “Pull yourself together,” he whispers, gripping the sides of the sink again as he tries in vain to gather his thoughts and ignore this newfound emotion that’s dwelling within him. 

It is one thing to want her with his body, and another entirely to want her with his soul, but that doesn’t mean the two aren’t connected. 

Standing up straighter, he runs his hands through his hair, smoothing it down one more time before he finally turns around, and makes his way back toward the party. 

By the time he’s back in his seat again, his wine glass has been filled an unknown time, and Rey is chatting animatedly with their host. Both women’s’ faces are lit up, brilliant grins parting their lips up until the moment one of them—Rose—spots him entering the room, and she points him out, then they both fall silent. 

Feeling sufficiently awkward, Ben takes his place beside his fiancé, offering her an awkward smile as he picks up his wine glass, and attempts to act normal. Luckily, the alcohol is starting to take hold from his first glass, and so the first sip of his second comes easily, the rich liquid falling down his throat with ease. It calms him some, giving him a bit more confidence than he’d had previously as he observes Rose and Rey’s conversation, which has been joined by a dark-skinned noble-man he recognizes from a town nearby. 

The man’s name is Finn Storm, if he recalls correctly from his recent attempt to join the Alderaanian knights, and he’s still waiting to find out if he’s earned it. When Ben last spoke with his father on the subject of knights, he’d heard only good things. Reason stood to believe that his fiancé and the heiress to one of the kingdom’s most powerful fortunes were currently speaking to one of his future knights. 

At the moment, the conversation has turned to the wine, Finn favoring Chadrilan wine while Rose and Rey both prefer the one they’re drinking, the one from Coruscant. “Chandrila’s wines aren’t as dry,” he’s protesting as Ben zones in and out of the conversation. 

“You act as if a dry wine is a bad thing,” Rey protests. “We all have different tastes.”

“With respect, your grace, not all tastes should be allowed existence.”

A chuckle passes around the table, then Rose reaches over and lays a hand on Finn’s shoulder. “Ah, Finn, don't feel bad for having a sweet tooth.”

“He likely just misses the juices of his youth,” Rey mutters, then the two women fall into laughter as their friend protests joyously, the chatter all around the room overwhelming Ben’s already troubled mind. 

The prince needs to join in on the conversation. He is the son of the head of state in this country, and by now he ought to have said something, but he doesn’t want to. There just isn’t anything he wants to say. 

In spite of realizing this, he just can’t quite seem to get an in on the conversation. He’s still too distracted, too wound up, until someone proposes they dance in the nearby ballroom. After all, a band has been playing music there since they arrived. Previously, it had been nothing but background noise, but as he finishes his wine glass, and everyone else decides they’re done with their meals, Ben, Rey, and the dozen or so other people decide that they are indeed going to head out into the ballroom to share a dance. 

He just hopes as the alcohol swims in his head that he’ll be able to remain firm on his feet. 

*

The Tico’s ballroom is perhaps one of the most elegant he’s seen in the entire country. The only one he can think of that would rival it would be that of the castle he calls home, which is large enough to host balls for hundreds of people to attend. This room isn’t quite that big, but there’s still far too much space for what he counts to be fourteen people. 

At least, he thinks it’s fourteen people, he’s somewhat inebriated and only becoming more so as the time goes on. He’s barely spoken a word as a result, finding himself shockingly quiet and even unaware of what everyone else is saying, but then there’s a hand being held out in front of him. 

Shock fills him when he realizes it belongs to his fiancé. She’s holding her hand out for him, white satin that he can still feel against his scalp waiting patiently for him to take it as hazel eyes look at him expectantly. 

“We should probably dance,” she says, pushing the hand forward just a little bit more. “It will look odd if we don’t.”

He doesn’t just swallow as he takes her hand, he  _ gulps.  _ For some reason, since he stepped out of that carriage with her earlier he’s been more nervous than ever before. They’d just shared a dance together weeks ago at his twenty-first birthday celebration, making their debut as an engaged couple for the first time, but back then his feelings for her had been a lot more black and white. Now they’re muddled. He’s still angry that she wants to hide what happened last summer and never talk about it, but after coming undone from her touch a second time, after realizing he’s been pining for what just happened for an entire year, he knows he is so much more than angry with her. 

That clarity is frightening. He’s terrified, and so he takes her hand, but he knows she can feel it shaking in hers. 

“Are you going to be able to dance?” she asks, sounding bored, but her question appears to him as a challenge. 

_ Oh,  _ he can dance. He can definitely dance even if he’s so nervous he’s about to break into a sweat and his knees are getting wobbly because he doesn’t know how to deal with these newfound emotions. He’ll show her who she’s about to marry. The Prince of Alderaan is no coward. 

The music begins as he leads her out onto the floor, and they begin to move. 

As luck would have it, Ben is a wonderful dancer even when drunk, if he says so himself. He sweeps Rey across the floor, his eyes never leaving hers once the band starts up a lively song, everyone pairs up, and they begin to move in time with the stroke of a string against a violin. 

He likes to think she seems impressed with his dancing. Somehow, he manages to catch a tiny glimpse of his fiancé smiling as they whirl about, and he even dares to twirl her around on the floor, her gown spinning out in a fierce sea of lavender around her before he pulls her back in, and she shudders in his arms as her hand rests on his shoulder, and they dance a little more closely together. 

“So you can dance.” She laughs nervously as she says it, one of the only times he’s ever heard her laugh with him. His mind is a mess, but he thinks the first happened in the carriage, or maybe when they made love last year. 

“You’ve known this, it isn’t new.”

“No, but you’ve had a few glasses of wine tonight, and ever since we left the carriage you’ve been shaking as if you were a newborn foal,” she explains, then she sighs, gripping him a little more tightly as she leans in closer. “Your highness, if you cannot contain yourself, we may need to depart early. My friends have taken notice of your demeanor and have expressed concern.”

“I-I hadn’t thought my demeanor was any of their business.”

“Ordinarily it wouldn’t be, but you know how people can talk.” Her tongue comes out to wet her lower lip, and his eyes are drawn to it helplessly as if they are his new sense of gravity. “Ben, you are walking about this party as if you have what just happened in that carriage written on your forehead.”

A flush creeps up his cheeks, coloring them a deeper crimson than some of the rouge coloring the women’s lips at the party. “But I haven’t said a word. Not about this at least. I’ve only spoken briefly to some of the noblemen about tax matters.”

The Duchess’ face briefly pinches in judgment, then she shakes her head. “I shouldn’t have done what I did. I had no idea of the impact it would have on you and your behavior.”

A tinge of hurt passes through him, and he loosens his grip on her, feeling as if she’s just betrayed him somehow. “You regret it?”

“I shouldn’t have done it,” she insists, then she looks around the room, and swallows again. “It was a mistake.”

That brings to mind another time she’d said those exact words, when they’d parted last year whilst he was still kiss drunk and splayed out beneath her, his wrists still buzzing from where she’d pinned him down as she broke his heart.  _ Forgive me, your highness _ , she’d said, as if she were apologizing for her actions. Little did she know that was exactly what he wanted. 

“Was last year a mistake? Do you regret what we did last year, too?” he asks, his lower lip trembling slightly, the alcohol making him more honest than he intends to be. 

“I never said regret.” Her voice is quiet, so soft he can hardly hear it, and he freezes as he realizes what she means. “I just said we shouldn’t have done it. Things were easier before.”

She’s right about that. Life was so much easier when all he had to worry about was how he would antagonize Rey the next time he saw her, but now he can’t do that. For one thing, it’s awkward now, and for another, he’s slowly starting to fall in love with her. 

By god, he’s such a fool, and as time goes on, he only continues to act like one. He really should've counted the glasses of wine he's drunk.

“You're a coward,” he growls, fighting back the urge to sneer at her as she looks up at him in shock. She can’t shut him up with a kiss this time. She has to listen. “I tried to ask you about it in the carriage and you kissed me to get me to shut up, but you can’t do that here. Even if I want you to.”

Her breathing shudders, her breasts heaving against the low neckline of her dress. “You want me to?” It’s spoken in a high-pitched, light voice that seems to be more air than raw vocal power. It’s nothing like the Rey he knows, and for once, he suspects he might just have control of the conversation. 

“I do. See, the thing about me, Rey, is I’m done pretending. We are about to spend a lifetime together. And whether or not I can hold a conversation with you that doesn’t end in an argument, I know I can admit one thing,” he says, then he lowers his voice as he leans forward to whisper in her ear. “What happened last summer? I liked it. I haven’t stopped thinking about it, and when you made me come in the carriage just now, those memories came back as fresh as the day they were made, and it’s made me honest.”

That’s a safe admission, right? She can know that she arouses him without knowing he’s feeling _ other  _ things, can’t she?

“Ben…”

“Your grace, you don’t have to like me personally, but please— tell me I’m not alone. Tell me that it meant something to you, too. Tell me you don’t regret it.”

“I already did,” she protests, then he stops, and catches her chin with one hand as the rest of the room continues spinning on around them, the other dancers completely ignorant of their predicament. 

“No. You told me you didn’t regret it, but you didn’t tell me why. I think we’ll be a lot more successful in our attempts to pretend we like each other if you are  _ honest  _ with me,” he says, then he steps back, breaking their dance position once and for all, but he holds out his hand for hers. “Walk with me.”

“Where?” It amuses him that she puts her hand in his as she asks the question, then lets him start to lead them out of the ballroom. “Where are we going, Ben? People will see.”

“They will see me walking away to commune with my fiancé. It isn’t anything to worry about,” he replies, leading them down a long corridor, his eyes on the glass doors at the end of it that he knows leads to the Tico’s rear garden. “This isn’t a conversation I want to have in front of an audience.”

“Agreed.” 

It doesn’t sound like she means it, though. Rey, like him, is scared, he’s simply more exhausted with being scared than she is. They both want the shelter of the crowd or the safety of a kiss, but they can’t keep doing this. They are about to be married in a little more than a month’s time. On some level at least, they must be honest with each other. 

That’s the only way this is going to work. 

She takes his arm, allowing him to lead her out of the rear doors and toward the garden. Faintly, he can hear the sound of a nearby water fountain as it splashes against itself, and he takes a slow breath as he realizes how quiet it is out here other than that little sound. He can barely even hear the music from the party where they are now, and that is terrifying. 

Maybe he needs the shield of an audience and kisses, too. 

“We’re alone,” Rey says after a moment, her shoulders tense as he leads her down the steps away from the house and toward the garden. 

He makes a mental note to thank whoever left lanterns burning out here later as he watches the light of one flicker over his fiancé’s face, allowing him to see every piece of it in vivid detail.  _ Good,  _ he thinks. He needs to be able to see her, needs to finally get some answers. “We are.”

“It’s a lovely evening.” She kicks at a pebble on the ground as they approach the water fountain, her eyes drawn to the green lily-pads floating on its surface. “You can see the stars in the water.”

_ Oh, so maybe not the lily-pads _ . Maybe that was just him. 

“You can, but we both know the stars and how beautiful they are arent what we’re here to discuss.”

“You want to know why I kissed you. Why I keep kissing you,” she says, blunt for the first time since things had changed between them last year. 

“Yes. I do. I want to know.”

“And what if I told you it was none of your business? What then?”

“Rey, we’re going to be married.”

“I know.”

“You’re going to be my wife.” A fact which he still cannot believe even as he says it. She’s going to be his wife, and one day, they will rule Alderaan together. Sometime after that, they will also command Jakku. “We are going to be together for the rest of our lives.”

“I know.”

“We have to start talking.”

“Shut u—“

“No,” he says sternly, holding a finger up between them. “Don’t shut me out. Not now, not tonight. We—we’re moving past this.”

Breathing in deeply, Rey steps forward, and her neck cranes slightly so that she can meet his gaze. “Fine. I enjoy kissing you, too. I happen to think it feels good. I enjoy fucking you, too. Getting my frustrations out with you like this instead of—well—arguing feels nice and makes me less angry, so yes. I enjoy it, and no…” She leans a little bit closer to him, then shakes her head. “You’re not alone.”

His breathing grows unsteady as he looks at her, as he feels the hand gripping his arm hold on a little more tightly as if he is tethering her to the Earth. “But you still hate me?” he asks, wondering if, after this admission, she would be bold enough to admit anything else. 

“I don’t see how you can be capable of changing. You always say something ignorant and then I get angry and then you get angry and we—“

“So you loathe me then?”

“I loathe you,” she says, but her voice waivers slightly, and her eyes avoid his. The words are fiercely spoken, but they are not strong. He would be a fool to interpret them as such. 

The temptation to call her a liar is remarkable. Somehow, he manages to restrain himself, and for a moment he simply looks at her astonished by how easily she seems to be able to deny anything. Eventually, he moves a little bit closer to her, and lets himself speak a tiny figment of what is on his mind. “And yet you want me.”

She looks at him as though she is an animal caught in a trap, slowly, ever so slowly, she nods. “This is where you should stop talking.”

“Are you going to kiss me now?” He asks, curious to see what she will do. “Have you grown tired of hearing me talk?”

A low growl comes from her throat, and she looks more frustrated with him than she ever has before for a few seconds, but then she leans forward grasping him by the lapels of his coat, and she does exactly as he predicted; she kisses him. He doesn’t hesitate to kiss her back. It’s like a reflex, the way his arms wrap around her, it seems like some sort of simple signal set in motion by biology. All those little synapses fire off in his brain, and he surrenders himself to it even if he isn’t done talking yet.

Water from the fountain roars in his ears as he kisses her, as he pulls her in tight against his body, and makes her silent down not to let go until she wants him to—until he’s certain she wants him to. It’s another head rush, Makes the entire world seem to spin as if he is in the middle of some sort of violent tornado, and yet there’s a tranquility to it. The simple fact that they are alone speaks volumes for how the kiss moves, and so he kisses her exactly like that, like no one is watching, because as far as he knows no one is. No one knows that they have broken their vows to hate one another. 

Pulling her tight against him, he feels his head spin further from the wine, and it makes him bold. He bends her back slightly, her body arching into his as her hands twine themselves in his hair, and she gives every inch of what she gets. 

“Are you happy now?” she asks him between kisses. “Is this what you wanted?”

Anger wells within him. Yes, this is what he wanted. He’s been wanting to feel this again since they left the carriage, but she still hates him, and it doesn’t feel the way he wants it to. The kiss is incredible, but as the time goes on, he finds himself wishing she would just tell him the truth.

“Shut up,” he says instead, not quite drunk enough to have the bravery to stop this kiss and tell her what she is as he resumes it with a renewed ferocity. 

It’s mind-bending and spell-binding, and over all too soon. Before he can deepen the kiss, she pulls away, both of them breathing hard as her hands fall down to his cheeks, and he can feel their warmth through the satin. Just like earlier, his heart pounds in his chest as if it’s a drum, and he feels as if he’s floating, as if the ground beneath them has disappeared, and they are floating in the stars. 

A shift occurs in the wind, in the nonexistent space between them, in the atmosphere that surrounds the two, and the last lingering traces of disdain from their conversation begin to fade. He can’t quite tell if it’s because they are genuinely starting to move past this or if it’s because he’s tipsy, but he feels as if he’s under a spell. 

Of course, no spell such as this can last forever, but she is slow to break it. She always is. Blinking, she runs a thumb over his kiss-swollen lips, and the touch makes him shudder as his eyes are drawn to hers, still wet and glistening just a little in the moonlight. It’s perhaps one of the most beautiful things he’s ever seen, and if he weren’t so busy holding her in his arms, he might just reach up and touch it, wipe that tiny little wet shine from her skin. 

He still might, he thinks as the satin of her fingers wanders away from his lips and onto his chin. “We should probably go back inside,” she says. “People will start to wonder where we’ve been.”

“Is that the only reason you want to go inside?” he asks, his voice slurred slightly as the wine continues to numb his brain. 

“You’re drunk,” she protests. “Don’t ask me questions you won’t remember the answers to in the morning.”

“Aren’t you drunk, too?” he asks, his fingers toying softly with the embroidery on her dress. “You had wine.”

“Not as much as you,” she tells him, her face falling just a little bit out of focus as she speaks. “There are so many things we can’t talk about.”

A low laugh rumbles in his chest, and he sighs as his hands fall to his sides, and for a moment, he just stands there staring at her, his anger forgotten in lieu of the alcohol that’s taking root in his brain. He’s not sure if it’s real, but as his eyes roam over her slightly disheveled form, he thinks for a second that she seems to glow in the moonlight.  _ God almighty,  _ he needs to sober himself. 

“So we’re going back inside?”

“We’re going back inside,” she says, then she takes hold of his arm. “And you’re going to have a glass of water.”

“I don’t want a glass of water,” he mutters as she leads him back towards the house, and through his liquor-addled brain, he starts to think that things have finally started to change, that maybe they have started to change. As they walk into the Tico’s house again, he starts to feel Hope well in his heart, swelling within his very soul as they stumble up the steps together, walking away from the water fountain and the spell they’d created in the moonlight, but still drowned in it all the same. 

*

The rest of the party is a bit of a blur, but as far as he can remember, once they’re back with the crowd, nothing spectacular happens. He and his fiancé share another couple of dances, he finally talks to Rose Tico for a couple of minutes—and is taught that if he ever hurts Rey during their marriage, she will kill him, lines of succession be damned—and at some point, he drinks a singular glass of water. 

It does little to aid the spinning in his head. 

By the time they’re back in the carriage, Ben is still a touch too giddy, still smiling even though Rey is rolling her eyes at him as she helps him into the carriage, and he’s giggling the entire time. Eventually, she must get curious, for as she climbs into the carriage with him, she groans. “What’s so funny?” she asks as she plops herself down in the seat across from him, then she closes the door. 

As the driver snaps the reins, he giggles again. “You’re being nice to me.”

“I’m being a decent human being. And you’re my fiancé, I can’t just leave you for dead, as tempting as that sometimes is,” she mutters, then she leans across the space between them, and forces him to sit up a little straighter by placing her hands on his shoulders, and pushing him into an upright position. The pressure makes him agonizingly aware that she’s touching him, and his heart starts hammering in his chest again, his cock twitching slowly back to life in his pants as if it’s already forgotten how uncomfortable it is to walk around with come in them. “I don’t have to like you in order to want to help you.”

Humming contentedly, Ben lets his eyes fall shut, and he leans back against the wall of the carriage as he protests. “You like me.”

“I don’t like you,” she mumbles, but as his eyes blink lazily open, he catches sight of a quiver in her lip, her eyes seeming far away and almost misty as she looks out the window. She’s lying, but he’s too drunk to fight her on it much further. 

“Liar,” he mutters quietly as his eyes shut again, and whether or not she hears him, he doesn’t know. One second he’s awake, and the next he is dozing off, drifting peacefully into the land of dreams as the carriage rocks through the countryside to take them both home. 

*

He wakes about half an hour later to Rey shaking his shoulder gently and whispering his name. The carriage has stopped, the gentle rocking that had soothed him to sleep is no longer present, and he frowns as he realizes she is leaning toward the door. 

“Ben, I’m going to leave now,” she tells him, and his sleepy, drunken mind doesn’t quite understand it. Where is she going? Why can't she stay? “I didn’t want to alarm you by leaving before you woke.”

_ Oh,  _ that’s nice of her, he thinks, but why can’t she stay? 

He reaches out for her hand as she begins to move toward the door again, catching it just before she can pull on the handle. “Don’t go, your grace.”

The Duchess’ cheeks turn pink, or at least, they seem to in the low light. “We don’t live together yet, Ben, I can’t stay.”

“Do you want to?” he slurs softly, his fingers toying gently with the satin of her glove as his eyes start to shut again. He wants them to be open.  _ God _ , why can’t he keep them open? 

Regret fills him as they close, and Rey falls silent, but he can hear her breath catch ever so slightly as she leans closer to him, tightening her grip on his hand as he starts fading into unconsciousness. 

There’s a gentle press of lips against his, and it takes him far too long to register that she’s kissing him, that she’s just kissed him completely unprompted and without looking for a reason to shut him up. She’s kissing him for a reason that he doesn’t understand, and it wakes him up for a half-second of blissful awareness as she then pulls away, leaving him stunned as she opens the carriage door. “Goodnight, your highness,” she says, then she’s gone, the carriage door shutting behind her as Ben stares flabbergasted at where she’d just stood, his fingers coming up to touch his lips as the carriage speeds away from the Kenobi household, and on towards his home. 

Ben falls asleep again within minutes, his memories falling into a blur as he manages to pass out, dreaming of her lips again the entire way home. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While you're here... I learned how to draw specifically for this fic.  
>   
> 


	6. Confessions

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I upped the chapter count again cause we have a LITTLE ways to go before this is done lol. anon comes off in a few days so if you don't already know who I am, I'm excited for you to find out. Anyone have guesses?

The hangover Ben wakes up with the next morning leaves him wishing he were dead. There’s a pounding against his skull that’s perfectly rhythmic, except instead of hearing a beat, all he feels is pain. 

A groan falls from his lips as he rolls over, turning away from the sun as its bright, golden rays penetrate his windows and light up the room. Right now, it is the last thing he needs. He’s trying to get his bearings together after whatever happened last night. He vaguely remembers dinner, dancing with Rey, and stumbling home, but altogether, the night is a blur. 

As his eyes blink awake, he finds himself wishing he could remember more of it. All he remembers is warmth, and the distinct feeling of her lips on his. Of course, he also remembers the carriage ride over to the Ticos’ house, but that had been before he’d started drinking. 

What he does remember, though, is that something had managed to shift between them, that somehow they’d finally started to make some kind of breakthrough in their relationship, but he can’t remember what happened. A blur of images fill his mind, accompanied by memories of feelings and sensations. There’s joy and hurt and the distinct feeling of silk against his fingers, her gloved hands gripping his firmly as they whirl across the dance floor, or as he kisses her, and yet he knows that’s not all of it. 

_Fuck,_ he’s going to have to ask her what happened last night, isn’t he? He desperately doesn’t want to, he’s worried that he must’ve acted something foolish last night, but she may be the only person who can provide him answers. 

And unfortunately, he isn’t close enough to either Rose or Finn to ask them for their advice, if he’s going to ask anyone, it’s going to have to be the Duchess. 

Before he can start mentally preparing himself to write to her apologizing for his actions last night, a knock sounds at his door, and he groans as he turns his head into the pillow. The knock is a sharp, three-part beat that repeats twice, which means it can only belong to his father. The king is the only person who knocks on his door like that. The servants don’t knock like that and neither does his mother.

 _Great,_ now the first person he’s going to confront is his father, and he can’t remember whether or not he made an ass of himself when he got home last night. He remembers falling asleep in the carriage, and he has an even more vague memory of himself stumbling down the hall toward his quarters, but he has no idea if he ran into anyone else on the way. 

The door to his bedroom opens in that moment, interrupting his possibly vain attempts to recall what happened as his father walks into the room with a smirk on his head to rival his own. That immediately makes it very clear to the prince that he is very likely to want to curl up into the fetal position and lay in bed all day by the time this conversation is over out of sheer embarrassment. 

“You’re alive,” his father says, shutting the door behind him as he walks into the room until he’s standing at the foot of his son’s bed, and crosses his arms over his chest. “We weren’t sure you’d be awake by now.”

Rolling his eyes, Ben turns over in bed, and buries his face in the pillow. “Would you mind leaving me alone?” he asks, then he winces at how coarse and rough his voice sounds. It almost makes him feel like he’s swallowed a handful of sand, but failed to cough it all up. 

“In a moment,” his father assures him, then he reaches into the pocket of his jacket, and pulls out an envelope. Even from where he’s laying in bed, Ben can see the crest of Jakku stamped onto its center. _Oh no._ “You have a letter.”

The king extends his arm out toward his son, the envelope just a touch too close to his face as he looks between it and his father. “Couldn’t one of the servants bring it to me?”

“I wanted to.” The bed dips as Han sits down on it, causing his son’s head to slump back against the pillow in frustration. Can’t he just be left alone? “You were quite talkative last night.”

“What?”

“Everything you said was rather slurred, but your mother and I understood just enough to get a good laugh out of it.”

He can feel himself blanch as he takes the letter out of his father’s hand. _What the hell did he do last night?_ “What happened?”

“You came into the library, scared the hell out of your mother, and rambled on and on about love for a good hour.” A chuckle escapes his father, then he sighs. “How long have you been in love with Rey?”

“No.”

“Ben.”

“Absolutely not.”

A pause, then the king slowly nods. “I get it, I took a while to come around to the idea, too,” he says, scratching his head as he stands, and looks down at the letter in Ben’s hand. “Maybe that ought to clear things up for you.”

His eyelashes flutter a couple of times in disbelief. “You read it?”

“No, but I’m sharper than I look,” he replies, then he steps back. “I’ll leave you to it.”

“Father?” he asks, stopping his father in his tracks as he sits up in bed, a memory from the night before popping into his mind. 

“Yes?”

“Would you ask mother if I could use my grandmother’s ring? I want to have something to give to Rey.”

“You do?”

“Yeah, could you please get it for me? She’ll be more likely to say yes if it comes from you instead.”

Smirking, his father gives him a nod. “Sure, but we both know that’s a lie,” he says, then he begins making his way out. 

Han’s footsteps echo as he walks out of the room, leaving his son feeling both confused and curious as he looks down at the letter bearing his name on the back of it in Rey’s perfect handwriting.

He wonders what’s in it, what she has to say to him about how he behaved last night. Odds are, she won’t provide him more insight as to what happened than his father did, but he’ll probably learn something at least. Surely he wasn’t a complete fool, was he?

Swallowing nervously, he begins opening the letter, his fingers tearing through the Jakku royal seal as he fights to get the paper out of the envelope. Once it’s free, he nearly tears it in his hurried effort to unfold it, wincing as it cuts the pad of his left middle finger, causing a tiny drop of blood to land on the paper. A swear leaves him as he finally renders the paper fully unfolded, and begins to read. 

* * *

Ben,

I’m writing this to you after a night of restless tossing and turning because, quite frankly, I cannot sleep. This isn’t your fault, but I’m sure I can find a way to blame you for it if I need to. It’s not dawn yet, but my candle is lit and I need to write to you so I can finally get some peace of mind. 

I’ve had an idea.

Last night was a good first step. I think we can both admit that it went a little rocky at first, but we’ve most certainly made a step in the right direction, a step towards forming a better relationship between us. 

However, I feel that given your unfortunate state of intoxication, though oddly charming, may have robbed us of a chance to do this properly. I want to see if we can tolerate one another whilst sober. If we can do that, we might have a chance at a decent marriage.

I’d like for us to take another stroll together, perhaps through the trail just beyond the castle grounds by the lake. Assuming the weather is on our side, I believe it may be an opportunity to further our work repairing things, one that won’t allow you the chance to make an ass of yourself.

That said, your drunken self was rather charming, if not rather irritating to be near. I found myself managing to smile at you for the first time as I departed your carriage, and I also found I was quite concerned about your health. I do hope you weren’t too ill this morning, your intoxicated state made me think you might be waking up hurt, but hopefully, by the time you receive this, you will have been recovered enough to consider walking with me. 

Stay well, Ben.

-Rey

Well, that doesn’t tell him anything. He still has no idea just how much of a fool he was last night, all he knows is that he was one. Apparently the only way he’s going to get any answers is if he meets with her in person, and especially after his revelations from the previous evening--revelations he barely remembers at best--he actually finds that he wants to spend time with her. 

Perhaps today is the day he becomes brave enough to admit that, to finally stop managing to goad her into arguments and stop saying all the wrong things, and actually change things between them. Well, maybe not today. It’ll take his letter until at least this evening or even tomorrow morning to reach her, but still. He’ll get it to her soon enough.

Setting the letter on his bedside table, Ben throws back his bedsheets, and slowly rises to his feet, making his way over to his desk so he can begin writing back to her. He’s not sure yet just what he will say, but he knows he wants to see her again as soon as possible.

The sooner he sees her, the sooner he will have a chance to kiss her again. It’s a thought he’d never imagine he’d have or want to have, but it is consuming him more and more with every passing second as he sits down and picks up his fountain pen, ready to ruin another piece of parchment paper as he thinks over what he’s going to write. 

Luckily, it comes to him with relative ease, and his hand rushes across the paper as he gives her the quickest and most sincere response he can muster. 

* * *

Rey,

I think that sounds like a wonderful idea. As such I’m writing to tell you that I’ve accepted your invitation. I too believe that we may have cheated a bit in our effort to bypass the contempt between us through alcohol, though I admit that was solely my fault.

At this time I would also like to apologize for my behavior. I cannot recall much of our evening together, I'm afraid, and I fear I may have acted a fool of myself and poorly represented us both in front of our friends. I hope I wasn’t as gone as I seemed, but in the event that I was worse than I think I was, I would like for you to know I am deeply, deeply sorry. 

Another apology I owe you is the one for causing you to be forced into this marriage by not having selected anyone before you. I may have apologized for this last night, but if I did, I’ve forgotten, and regardless, I would like it to be perfectly clear that I deeply regret it. Not that I believe you will be a terrible marriage partner, but I regret it nonetheless, especially given that it was the reason for our most recent argument. 

Thank you for writing to me so soon, and again, I am deeply sorry for any grief I may have caused you last night. 

I’ll be seeing you soon.

-Ben

Once he’s done writing, he rereads the letter approximately six times, then he finally decides to fold it, sealing it in an envelope with the seal of Alderaan before he leaves it on the desk for it to be taken to the mail. His head is still pounding with a horrific ache as he stands up from the desk, but he knows he must get on with his day. He can’t just sit on his ass all day and wait for Rey to receive and reply to his letter. Now he has to wait for her, now he has to find ways to pass the time until he can see her again. 

If only that were an easy task. 

*

Somehow, he manages to pass the time, and three days later, he finds himself standing at the front steps of the castle staring down at Rey’s carriage as it approaches his home. He can’t see into the windows, but he figures she just has the curtains drawn. It doesn’t matter anyway, he’ll be seeing her again in a matter of minutes, but still, he wishes he could gauge what she is thinking as she approaches. 

Surely she can see what he’s thinking written on his face plain as day. His parents and his knights always tell him his face is one of the easiest to read, and so logic says that Rey too will be able to see what he’s thinking even from a distance just as they can. 

He doesn’t want to know what she thinks is on his mind. He’s almost afraid to ask. He just hopes she can’t tell that his mother’s ring is sitting in his pocket, that the white diamond feels like it’s boring a hole through his clothes, skin, and bones as he waits for her to pull up to the castle. 

There is no reason for Ben to be nervous, and yet, he is. 

Eventually, the carriage pulls up, and Rey’s driver opens the door for her, allowing the duchess to step out onto the ground just beneath the steps, her skirts a shade of green opposite of the purple from the other night, though perhaps a little paler than the lavender that had swept around them as they’d danced. As she walks towards him and the carriage pulls away, he finds himself appreciative of the way the lightweight fabric catches on the wind, her small, gloved hand struggling to keep a hold of it as the other reaches out for him. 

“Good afternoon, your grace,” he says, taking hold of her hand and bringing it to his lips, which tingle slightly as they press against the satin of her glove. 

“Good afternoon, your highness,” she replies, then he holds out an arm for her, waiting patiently for her to take it before the two of them descend the steps, and begin making their way from the castle grounds onto the path she’d suggested they walk on for the day. 

For a few seconds, they walk in silence, both of them just listening to the birds chirping in the trees and the gentle rustle of the wind through their clothing. It’s kind of nice, he thinks, and though they’ve been on walks such as this before, the frustrating sort of tension that usually exists between them has simmered down some. They’re both still tense, still a little too nervous, but it’s a good sort of nervous. 

It means they’ve actually managed to make some progress. Maybe their marriage isn’t doomed to be a disaster after all. Maybe when he gives her his mother’s ring, he’ll actually be able to keep a straight face and the proposal—a word which doesn’t feel accurate given that they’re already engaged—will go smoothly. 

He doubts it’ll be that easy. 

The silence even breaks sooner than it usually does, which surprises him, especially because she’s never the one to talk first. “I got the impression from your letter that you don’t have much of your memories from the other night.”

A nervous laugh escapes him. “No, I don’t.” He rests a hand over the one she has on his arm, looking down to meet her eyes as he fights back the urge to look at her lips. “I was sort of hoping you could tell me, I’m afraid it’s all a bit of a blur for me.”

Disappointment crosses her features, her face falling slightly as she looks up at him, and her eyes become downcast. “Oh.”

“Did something important happen?”

“No, it’s just…” There’s a blush coloring her cheeks. “We finally managed to get along, and seeing you like this, not remembering it? I’ll be honest, it hurts me.”

“I’m sorry,” he replies, squeezing her hand gently as he hopes that’s the right gesture for this situation. How is one supposed to act when they actually like someone else and enjoy their company? All they know is contempt, so this newfound camaraderie between them is foreign territory, and he has no clue how to navigate it. “Can I tell you what I do remember?”

Cheeks turning a deeper shade of pink, his fiancé manages to meet his gaze out of the corner of her eye, then she nods. “Yes, you may.”

“I remember the carriage ride over. We danced, and I drank far too much wine, and I remember teasing you, and you didn’t want to talk but I did, and then we kissed again, then I think we danced some more, and…”

“We went home shortly after.”

“Right. I just…” He pauses, both of them ceasing their walk for a moment as he tries to summon forth the question he wants most desperately to ask. “I can’t remember if anything happened on the carriage ride home.”

“Oh…” Her expression is unreadable. He can’t quite gauge what she’s thinking as they begin walking again, and he can see memories he does not possess dancing behind her eyes. 

“Oh?”

“I—nothing happened. I was just making sure you, um, stayed upright and didn’t die.”

There’s an awkward twitch against his arm as she says this, and he can’t help but notice that she’s struggling to meet his gaze. It occurs to him that he is being lied to, but he can’t imagine why. He’d thought they’d moved past the lying to each other, and to hear her doing it again—well—it leaves him feeling as though _he_ is the disappointed one now. “Is that all?”

She bites her lip, looking as though she’s unsure whether or not to tell him the truth, then she lets out another anxious laugh. “Well, you kept mumbling incoherently,” she says, brushing a stray piece of her hair back behind her ear. “I think you… uh…” Another pause. “Listen, you were very drunk. Incredibly drunk. The most drunk I’ve ever seen a ma—“

“What did I say?” They pause again just outside of the castle grounds, this time it feels as if the entire world stops with them, and he can feel his heart pounding against his chest as he anticipates her answer. “Was it something awful?”

“No, not at all, I only specify that you were drunk because I want to make it clear to you that I am not accusing you of anything.” They resume their walk as she speaks, gesticulating casually with her free hand as she grips him a little more tightly. “Ben, you asked me to stay with you the other night, and given that we’ve never been particularly kind to one another a day in our lives, I figured it was just a drunken ramble that you never meant to let slip.” Eyes falling away again, she sighs. “And you accused me of actually liking you.”

“Oh god.”

“It’s all right. I can’t promise I would’ve been much better in your state, but it did make me curious.”

“I am so sorry. The impropriety of asking you to stay alone—“

“Ben, we’re engaged to be married, I promise, it isn’t the most scandalous thing you could’ve done.”

“Still, I’m embarrassed. Did I do anything else?”

“No. I kissed you good night and left. Anything you did to cause yourself further injury, you’ll have to ask your parents.”

He snorts his amusement at that. “They have been rather vague and unhelpful about that night. My father told me I was slurring and acting in a way I never have before, but he won’t tell me much else, except…”

“Except what?”

This time, he could feel _his_ cheeks flush pink. “Well, I may have apparently gone on a tangent about you.”

Her eyebrows rise closer to her hairline. “Oh? And what did you say?”

He shouldn’t tell her this. It’s too much, the risk of something going wrong is too high, but she didn’t lie to him, so he ought to show her the same courtesy. The only way this is going to work is if they are honest with each other. “I apparently told them I’d had a change of heart.”

A sharp hiss fills his ears as her breath catches in her throat. “What sort of change?”

 _This was a mistake,_ he thinks, gritting his teeth. He never should’ve opened his mouth. “Just that I didn’t hate you anymore.”

At this, she tilts her head high, glancing in the direction of the nearby lake as she avoids meeting his gaze directly. “There was something else from the carriage, you know,” she says, turning them slightly so that they’re walking right underneath the thick branches of the oak trees lining their path. “You accused me of liking you, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And I denied it.”

“You did?”

“You called me a liar.”

“Were you?”

“You are, too,” she reminds him, then she lets go of his arm as he freezes in place, realizing what she just said as she takes a few steps forward. 

Did she just—? “You like me?”

A few feet away from him, she comes to a stop, then spares him a glance over her shoulder. “I might.” Then she turns toward him. “If you weren’t a liar.”

A smile starts to tug at the corners of his mouth, then he steps forward. “But it’s true?”

She shakes her head. “Not until you’re honest with me, your highness. It’s going to take a lot more than this to cure all the animosity between us.”

“Are you joking?"

“No, why?”

Scoffing, he takes a few more steps forward until he’s in her space, and not for the first time, she’s staring up at him, her neck craned so she can look into his eyes as frustration begins to well within him again. “I ask you if we’re finally at a point where we can move past all of this once and for all, and you—“

“Shut up.”

“Kissing me again will not make me shut up, your grace, I’m going to finish my sentence.”

This time, she’s the one grunting in contempt as she grabs hold of his hand, and leads him around to the far side of a tree. They’re out of view of the castle now, but still, whatever she’s planning to do, he has a feeling he’s not going to want to be in plain view of the road either, even if it isn’t too crowded today. “I’m not kissing you,” she says, letting go of his hand as both of hers meet his shoulders, and he’s being pushed back into the bark of a tree, the feeling bringing back memories of last summer. His cock starts getting helplessly hard in his pants, his eyes drifting upwards as if to ask god why the hell he would do this to him now, and pray that she doesn’t notice. “You don’t deserve to be kissed.”

“I don’t?”

“No. You won’t tell me what you really said. I think that makes you a liar, and not only a liar, but a coward.”

“I’m no coward.”

“Then tell me the truth.”

Oh no. He can’t do that. He’s still barely coming to terms with these feelings himself, he’s not ready to talk about them with her yet, he needs a little more time. If he admits what he’d told his parents, the excuse that he was drunk will only go so far. “I can’t.”

Resignation fills her features as her hands drift down over his chest. “Tell me,” she orders him, her fingers continuing downward. “Or I’ll make you tell me.”

Gasping slightly, he shivers as her hands brush down over his abdominal muscles. “How?”

“I won’t kiss you,” she says, her fingers ghosting over the rather sizable tent in his trousers. “Not until you tell me what you said.”

“I don’t remember.” He inhales sharply as she palms him through his clothing, and he loses all sense for a couple of seconds. “ _Fuck._ ”

“But you were told.” The Duchess begins undoing the laces of his trousers, his cock somehow growing harder as she works to pull it free. “So tell me.”

Another soft little moan leaves him as she frees his cock, taking it in her hand as she begins stroking him gently, her fingers gliding over the length of it before her thumb swipes gently at his tip. His head falls back against the tree trunk as she picks up the pace, stroking him a little faster as he loses all trace of thoughts in his brain. How can she expect him to answer her questions when he can’t speak like this?

Ben is a mess, a complete, utter mess, and she isn’t even kissing him. The universe is laughing at him, it finds his misery hilarious, but he finds it brings him an unexpected amount of bliss. 

“I can’t,” he pants, his voice becoming incoherent and high pitched as she brushes her lips ever so slightly against his neck, then pulls away before he can get the contact he’s so desperately longing for. 

“What was it, Ben?” 

“C-can't,” he breathes, swearing quietly as his eyes fall shut, and he struggles to remain on his feet. 

“Can’t or won’t?”

Another breathless sigh leaves him, his chest heaving as she swipes her thumb over the tip of him again, this time more slowly, as if she’s trying to draw out his pleasure for as long as she can. He thinks back to the feelings he’d started to develop last night, how he’d started to think he was falling for her. That much he can remember, and that much still rings true. No one else has this effect on him, no one else has ever come close to making his head spin, and he knows that’s the truth she’s trying to pull from his lips even if she doesn’t. He loves what she’s doing to him, he loves _her._

Fuck. He loves her. 

“Can’t.”

“Liar,” she hisses again, and this time he can hear his own voice accusing her of doing the same thing, he can feel the warmth brought on by alcohol in his veins as he looks at her in the dim light of the carriage, and suddenly the events of that night start becoming clearer again. 

“Won’t.”

“Will you tell me if I make you come?” she asks, then she strokes him faster, her other hand spreading out on his chest as she raises an eyebrow. “Hmm?”

He wonders if she can feel how hard his heart is pounding as they both anticipate his answer. Can she feel him slowly becoming dizzy as he loses his mind? As he gets closer to the edge? “Yes.”

“Then come for me, Ben,” she whispers, her soft voice nearly sending him over the edge as she strokes him a little faster. 

“I’ll get it on your dress.”

“No you won’t,” she insists, stepping to the side of him, her entire body leaning against his as he feels the wave he’s been riding start to crest, and he begins to fall apart. “Tell me the truth, Ben.”

His mind is not his own. That’s the only reason he can fathom for why he says what he says when he comes, but it doesn’t change the fact that he says it anyway. In the midst of all the dizziness and head-spinning, Ben finds himself whispering mostly incoherent nothings, but one thing is abundantly clear. “I love you,” he says, the truth finally falling from his lips as he starts coming down from his high, and Rey freezes even as come continues to spill from his cock. 

“Ben?” she asks, and his eyes widen with terror as he stands up straight, and stares at her. 

Both of them are panting hard, their eyes holding a silent conversation as if they’re trying to figure out whether or not either of them really heard what he just said. Regret fills him as he watches terror fill her eyes, and she covers her mouth with her hands, shaking her head from either shock or dismay. He can’t tell which it is that she’s feeling. 

“Rey, I—“

“I have to go,” she says, wiping her hands on her skirts as she checks herself briefly to make sure her appearance isn’t too disheveled before she runs from the oak tree. “I’ll see you at the wedding!”

“Wait!” he cries, feeling as if the ground has just been swept out from under him. “I didn’t—“

“Goodbye!” she cries, and though he’s rushing to tuck himself back into his trousers and relace them as fast as he can, he knows it’s not enough. He won’t catch up to her before she gets back to the castle, before she gets back into her carriage and escapes back to the confines of her borrowed manor. 

All he can do is stand there by the tree and watch as she runs away, as her skirts catch in the wind, and a sea of green paints his vision before she disappears beyond the hill, heading far away from him as if she truly is determined not to see him until their wedding three and a half weeks from now. A pit begins to form in his stomach as she runs, his body sinking slowly to the grass beneath the oak as he slumps against its bark, realizing that maybe while he’s finally come around to love her, she doesn’t feel the same way about him. 

He’d thought it all meant something. He’d thought that because she’d kissed him goodnight, because she’d wished he would be well in the morning, because she’d danced with him and laughed and smiled, that maybe things were changing, but maybe she did only just like him. She didn’t love him. 

If she had, she wouldn’t have run, and the Prince of Alderaan wouldn’t be alone beneath an oak tree wishing he’d found some other way to tell her how he felt, and that somehow, by some miracle, she felt the same. 

And as his hand falls into his pocket, he realizes one last great tragedy. In all of the chaos, he’d forgotten the most important thing, the primary reason he had come out here with her in the first place. 

He’d forgotten to give her his mother’s ring. 


	7. History Lesson

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GOD THE BARE MINIMUM EDITING JOB WAS DONE HERE LOL BUT WE TRIED

It haunts him for days. Not only is he haunted, though, he’s weighed down, and not just by the ring in his pocket that he still needs to give her. He remembers how he felt in the moments before he made his way into his birthday party, how he’d wanted to hide, and how the clothes he wore made him feel their significance in their weight. 

Like his clothing, there are so many layers to his emotions. 

He just wishes he didn’t feel so damn miserable. Eventually, he knows he’ll hear back from Rey, that she will someday either respond to his letters or he will see her on the day they marry, but until that happens, it’s going to kill him not to hear from her. 

It’s only been a week, and he’s already dying. The people around him can tell, too. His father has poked fun at how gloomy he’s been, how down he’s seemed, and his mother tries to get him to stop sometimes, but she’s also joined in. Neither of them, though, has figured out exactly  _ why _ he’s so upset. 

Not that he will ever tell them. How does one tell their parents that the reason they’ve become melancholy is that in the throes of passion, they declared their love for the woman stroking their cock? That most certainly isn’t something he could ever speak to them about. 

Armitage and Poe, on the other hand, he does manage to tell them  _ something.  _ With two and a half weeks until his wedding, he is feeling nervous and loose-lipped. Things begin to spill out with only the slightest bit of prompting. 

Or rather, they do after Ben nearly steers his horse completely off the trail for the fifth time that day. 

“Ben!” Poe’s voice shouts, interrupting his reverie as he quickly corrects his path, and the other two laugh at him. “Your head is not with us today, is it?”

“My head is…”

“Not with us,” Armitage finishes for him. “Hasn’t been for days. I don’t know what’s going on, but you need to get it back.”

Poe rolls his eyes as he brings his horse alongside Ben’s. “Come on, don’t be an ass, Armitage.”

“I’m not being an ass, it’s true! We have a new knight now and he needs training. He’s not going to get it if our commander is off--” He gestures vaguely between the three of them. “I don’t know--daydreaming. He’s daydreaming.”

“I’m not daydreaming!” Ben protests, but then the other knight holds up a hand, and he looks into the eyes of the man who’d just defended him, knowing full well that he is daydreaming and everyone around him can see it, too. 

“Ben, you’ve been out of it. As much as it pains me to say it, Armitage is right. You haven’t been with us,” Poe replies. “Whatever it is, you need to gather yourself. Finn needs a teacher, a good one. I’ll teach him if you won’t, but you are the prince, your highness.”

Something in Ben snaps, and he shakes the reins slightly in his hands as he whips his head in Poe’s direction. “I know!” He’s breathing heavily now, his entire chest heaving as he closes his eyes, pulling himself together as he tries to find the words to explain what’s been happening to him. “I--I--It’s about my wedding.”

“Of course it’s Rey,” Armitage mutters, causing Poe to lean across the space between their horses and smack him upside the head. “Ow!”

“Shut up.”

Ben, to his credit, ignores them. “I accidentally told her I love her.”

That silences any bickering between the two. “Oh,” Poe manages to say at the same time as Armitage says, “I knew it.”

The former of the two scoffs. “No, you didn’t.”

“I did, too!”

“Would you two shut up?” Ben asks, resting his hands on the saddle as he sighs. “I told her I loved her and she ran away. She hasn’t spoken to me since.”

Armitage and Poe spare a glance at one another, then the former of the two laughed. “Have you tried reaching out to her?”

“Of course I have. I’ve written her five letters in the past week. The only thing having stopped me from writing ten is my mother forcing some sense into me.” He laughs to himself, then he looks up at his knights. “I don’t know what else to do. I need to see her again before the wedding.”

“You know she only lives a ten-minute ride away from here, don’t you?” Poe points a finger to the west, over by the foot of the hills where he knows Rey’s home is tucked away in the trees. “Well, her temporary home. Soon enough she’ll be living in the castle with you.”

“I know?”

“Then ride over to her. Take a horse and just… go,” Armitage says, the other knight nodding in agreement as they both point in the direction of Rey’s manor. “Ask for her.”

It isn’t a bad idea. He can go over there right now and ask to see her, ask her why she hasn’t spoken to him in more than a week. Why she’s allowed enough time to pass without speaking with him. He needs to know, he needs to know now, and he’s already on horseback…

A breeze blows past him, brushing his hair back from his shoulder as he looks up to the sky, watching as dark clouds begin to pass overhead, turning what had been a bright and sunny day into something new. A storm is coming, he knows. The weather for the ride he plans to take is going to be far from ideal, and he knows, logically, that they should turn back toward the castle and he should embark on this journey tomorrow. 

Ben, however, is the son of Han Solo. He doesn’t always make good decisions, and he certainly doesn’t make the best decision first. He’s going to ride to her in the rain, and he’s very likely to develop some sort of illness as a result, but he has to know what happened. 

“I think I will,” he replies, then he taps his heels against his horse's sides, and it slowly begins to walk forward. “You both can ride back. Don’t wait for me.”

“It’s about to storm, Ben,” Poe warns him, but all the prince does is snap the reins, and he’s flying down the trail toward Rey, the knights shouts for him to come back fading into the background as thunder rolls overhead. 

A part of him fears being struck by lightning, but as the horse enters a gallop, he thinks he’ll at least make it to Rey’s manor before any hits the ground. At least before any hits near where he is. 

Still, that fear makes him go faster, the landscape passing him by in a blur as a cloud of dust swirls in his wake. His heart is pounding in his chest, adrenaline coursing through his veins in a way that makes him feel more alive than ever before, and he’s breathing hard, wondering if he’ll ever come down from whatever this is. 

The thought of Rey rejecting him again when he gets there calms him down a little, and he gulps nervously once her home comes into view, wondering if this will all end terribly and he will finish this day soaked to the bone, sick, and struck by lightning. 

At the bare minimum, he is getting soaked to the bone. As he rounds the corner of the path heading into her manor, the rain begins to pour. Fat, wet droplets of water smack into his face like tiny little bullets, nearly blinding him even as they begin to soak through his thick jackets and boots. His mother is going to kill him later, and Rey is quite possibly going to grind him to a pulp, but this is worth it. 

He hopes it will be worth it. 

The rain somehow comes down even harder, rendering Ben almost blind on his final approach, but eventually, he makes it, and disembarks from his horse beneath the thick branches of an oak tree in an attempt to keep the creature dry. He ties the reins around a low hanging branch, promises the horse that he’ll be back--which strikes him as odd, the horse isn’t exactly capable of understanding human speech-- then he looks up to the front of the manor, where rain drips off the covered balcony that surrounds the house. 

Somewhere inside those doors, his fiance is completely unaware that he is out here, unless she somehow heard the galloping of his horse from inside. He’s open to the possibility, but as he walks back into the rain, as he shields his eyes from the torrential downpour, he doesn’t think she knows. 

The water is roaring in his ears on his final approach, his footsteps kicking up water as his feet thud up the steps toward the front entrance. The sound, however, is drowned out by his anxiety as he finally reaches the door, droplets falling from the strands of his soaked hair as he takes in one last deep breath, then he knocks three times, and prays she’ll answer him.

Footsteps sound from behind the door for a couple of seconds, and he straightens up, certain that it doesn’t stop him from looking like a drowned rat as he prepares for someone to answer the door. 

Much to his surprise, it’s Rey who opens it, her face going pale the second she lays eyes on him. For a moment, time stands still as she opens the door wide, and he watches her face fall, both of them knowing that there’s no point in running from this now. They have to have this conversation. At the bare minimum, they have to have it before their wedding. 

Even if it scares the daylights out of them both. 

“Ben,” she breathes, stepping out onto the deck as she looks him up and down for the first time, taking stock of just how wet he is. “What the hell are you doing? You’ll get yourself sick.”

“I don’t care,” he replies, watching as she shuts the door behind her. For the first time since they’d been together last summer, he realizes she isn’t wearing gloves. If she touches him right now, he will come into contact with her bare hands. He’s not sure if he’d survive that. He barely survives touching her through those satin gloves she wears. “I had to see you.”

“Ben…”

“The other week, when you--when you left, I f-forgot to g-give you s-something,” he says, feeling the cold of the water soaking his body start to sink in through his clothes. “I-I w-was supp-posed to give you a ring.”

All she does in response is blink at him. “What?” 

He takes in a slow, shaky breath as she steps closer to him, though he’s pretty sure most of the shaking is due to how terrified he is rather than the cold. “When we went to R-Rose’s d-dinner party? We tried talking to one another for the first time.”

“And we thought it was funny how we were getting married soon, but neither of us had an engagement ring,” she finishes, then he nods, and she closes her eyes, seeming to try to think of what to say next as the roar of the storm continued to drown out most other noise around them. “I remember.”

The corners of his mouth twitch upward in response, and his shoulders lose their tension as she rests a hand on his cheek, brushing aside a few stray droplets of water. All he can hear is the sound of their breathing mixing in the air between them in the form of a fog. Up until now, he hadn’t noticed that the air was cold, just that the water was. Now he feels it, and goosebumps form along his skin everywhere she touches him as her fingers brush the droplets off of his neck. 

“What are you doing?” His voice is trembling as he speaks, but so is the rest of him. She doesn’t seem to mind, anyway, and it makes him think that maybe she’ll give him an answer today, that things will finally start to feel right between them.

“Do you want to come inside? You shouldn’t stand out here in the cold,” she says, then she takes one of his hands in hers. “Please, it’ll give us the chance to talk.”

When he nods, there’s no hesitation, though he’s pretty sure the reason his head is moving can mostly be attributed to how cold he is. “Yes, please.”

Rey’s quick to respond, reaching behind herself for the doorknob before she grabs hold of one of his increasingly numb hands, and leads him inside, warmth washing over him the second he enters her home, and she closes the door behind him. Another part of his body comes to life when she places her hands on his shoulders a few seconds later, and begins to peel his coat from his shoulders. “I don’t intend to sound crass, but we need to get you out of these wet clothes. You’ll catch something if we don’t.” She then makes quick work of his vest, coming back around to the front of him as she flings the coat over her shoulder, and begins undoing the other buttons. “I think my grandfather has a few things lying around that you can borrow.”

“Where is your grandfather?” he asks, curious that he hasn’t heard anything from the King of Jakku in all of this. 

“Out on a hunting trip,” she replies, then she gasps softly as she reaches the bottom of his vest, clearly having noticed the erection that’s begun to create a tent in his trousers. “He won’t be back until sundown.”

“The sun’s already down, and the weather--”

“They’re probably riding it out in his carriage.” She takes his clothes, then walks over to a nearby coat rack, hanging both of the dripping wet pieces of fabric before she takes his hand again, yanking him a little forcefully as she pulls him into a room off to the side. The walls are lined with bookshelves, and they’re filled with books, but the desk on the left end of the room over by the window indicates that this isn’t a library, but the King’s study. 

On the far side of the room, two chairs sit in front of a fireplace, a fire already roaring in front of them, bathing the red fabric in orange light as well as drawing his attention to a little mahogany table between them, an open book that’s waiting to be picked up again resting at the center of it all. It becomes abundantly clear to him what Rey intends to do with her fiance as he’s led over to one of the chairs, then she shoves lightly at his chest to push him down into it. 

Once he’s sitting, she holds up a finger to his lips before he can say anything, but he still finds his jaw falling open in shock. “Rey--”

“Take off your clothes, I’ll be right back,” she tells him, then she steps back, still panting slightly as he stares blankly up at her. “Go on, do it.”

“Right, sorry,” he breathes, his still trembling fingers reaching for the top button of his shirt, slipping it through the hole as she makes her way from the room, her skirts rustling in a small chorus as she makes her way from the room, leaving him speechless and without a thought in his head as he continues working his way down the row of buttons, trying not to think about how within a matter of minutes, he will be naked in her grandfather’s study. 

He’s going to be naked in front of her for the first time. Even last summer when they’d taken one another’s virtue, they hadn’t seen everything. There has never been a moment between them where they’ve been completely bared to one another, and he shivers as he sheds the shirt, as he slides his suspenders from his shoulders, and discards them both in a wet pile at his feet. 

It’s amazing that he manages, honestly. He’s shaking so terribly he thinks it’s a miracle that he has the stability to undo the laces of his boots. A small lake pours out of each one as he shakes them out, then sets them down just beside his shirt and suspenders. All that’s left now is his trousers, and that--that scares the hell out of him. 

Sure, he’s got underwear on, and it’s only mild levels of damp, but even still this will be the most exposed he’s ever been in front of her. A part of him, however, is thrilled at the idea, and it thrives on the thought of her walking back in and seeing him like this. That same part wonders if she’ll react to it--how she’ll react to it, but he can’t allow himself to think hard on it for too long, he needs to remove his trousers before his courage abandons him entirely. 

Swallowing his fears, he reaches for the laces of his trousers, undoing them as tactfully as he can before he slips them off--well, to be precise,  _ peels _ them off--and tosses them into the pile as well just as the door to the study opens again, and he turns to see Rey staring at him from behind a pile of clothes that look as though they’ve seen better days, but they’re still nice. 

The moment their eyes lock, Ben notices her cheeks coloring, though that could just be a trick of the firelight. Either way, he relates to it, he thinks he might be about to turn crimson himself as she enters the room, holding out the clothes to him once she gets close, seeming to struggle to look him in the eye. “I hope these work,” she tells him as he accepts the clothing, his fingers skimming over the fabric. “They were my father’s, actually. I thought he'd be a little closer to your size.”

_ Oh _ . He inhales sharply as he meets her gaze again, remembering the reason she lives with her grandfather instead of her parents. “Rey, I can’t accept these.”

“Would you rather sit here naked, then?” she asks, then she kneels down at his side, pushing the clothes into his lap as they finally hold one another’s gaze. “It’s all right, I promise. I wouldn’t give you these if it weren’t. You’re about to be my husband, are you not?”

“Your grace--”

“Don’t.” She puts a hand over one of his, then she shivers slightly as she stands. “Just put them on.”

Nodding slowly, he stands up, setting the clothes down on the chair, then he reaches for the shirt, and slides it over his head. “You never talk about them.”

“That’s what started our first fight,” she says quietly, stepping around him to take her place in the other seat before leaning forward, and placing her elbows on her knees. “You made some snide comment about my parents, and the wound was still so fresh, I took out all of my grief, and rage, and anger on you, and I’ve been doing it ever since.”

He pauses as he reaches for the trousers she’d set out for him, his fingers still shaking badly enough that he can’t get a grip on them for a couple of seconds. “I didn’t know that. I just assumed you hated me from the moment we met.”

“I didn’t. You were just a convenient source for me to take out my anger on, because you responded to my fire with more fire. It was wrong of me, and it still is. I’ve been--” Laughter falls from her lips followed by a sniffle, and he watches, feeling his heart break a little for her, as she dabs at her eyes. “Ben, I should have communicated with you, I should have tried to be kinder to you, and I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“For what? For grieving?” he asks, shoving his legs into the trousers, then he struggles with the laces for a moment--Rey’s father was apparently just a bit smaller than he is--as he looks at her again. “Rey, I could’ve been kinder to you, too. I think for a moment, we even made a start on the night of Rose’s party.”

“We did.” This time, she’s the one who swallows. “But you were drunk.”

“But it was the best we’ve ever been.” Then he reaches for the suspenders she’d given him, clipping them to the waistband of the trousers as he speaks. “And last week was good, too, until…”

“Until I left.”

“Yes.” Another pause occurs as the prince reaches for the vest she’d given him. “Why did you leave?”

Rey looks away from him, her eyes falling to the floor as her fingers pick at a loose thread on her dress. It’s a vague attempt to distract herself--to distract both of them--from reality, but she can’t avoid it forever. “I was shocked,” she says after a while, but she still won’t look at him. “I don’t… I don’t know why I left.”

“I thought we agreed to stop lying to one another,” he retorts, then watches as the corner of her mouth tilts up just the tiniest bit. “So why did you leave?”

“I was shocked.” It’s the same sentence as before, but this time, it feels genuine. This time, it isn’t a lie. “But it was more than that, you caught me so off-guard, and I got scared. When someone tells you that, you’re supposed to say it back, and up until then, I’d never had to confront my feelings for you so bluntly.”

_ That  _ catches his attention. He’s alert now, sitting up straighter as he tugs on her father’s jacket. “Your feelings for me?”

“I don’t know, please don’t press me further, I’ll tell you when I’m ready, but I can admit that, yes…” She sighs as she reaches across the space between them, her hand resting over the open book on the little table as her eyes shine in the firelight. Colors dance in her irises as he takes her hand, shocked by how warm it is when he laces his fingers with hers. “I feel something for you other than loathing, and what I feel, it runs deep, deeper than anything I’ve felt since my parents’ death, and that scares me.”

His thumb runs gently over the back of her knuckles. “I’m so sorry, Rey.”

“No, don’t be. I… They’re not coming back. They’re gone, and I’ve had a good life in spite of it, a charmed one, and I’m lucky, I suppose. I get to marry you and not some stranger. My other option was the king of Chandrila, you know.”

“He’s an ass.”

“He is.”

They both laugh at this, then exhale heavily, the smiles still not fading from their lips even as he lets go of her hand, and stands up, making his way from the room as she stares at him curiously. “You consider yourself lucky to marry me?”

“I do. For all your faults, Ben, you care. I know I would never normally admit this, but if we’re going to be honest with one another now, I think you’re kind, caring, and perhaps one of the better men I’ve ever met, even if you know how to push me over the edge in anger.”

“I know how to push you over the edge in other ways, too,” he says, causing her to groan as he reaches into the pocket of his still soaked coat, and pulls out his mother’s ring. “But that’s not what I came here for.”

He walks back into the room, watching her lip quiver as she catches sight of the little diamond in his hand. “Ben.”

“I told you I wanted to give you my mother’s ring, and I will, but I need you to promise me something.” 

“What do you need?” she asks, her voice softer than he’s ever heard it as he approaches, getting down on one knee as if he’s making a proper proposal, as if they are two long-time lovers preparing to make these vows. Perhaps they are, even if they don’t know it yet. He’s in love with her, but she’s still grasping what it means to be in love with him, and he won’t push her. 

“When we are married, please, if you can, tell me what it is you feel for me if it isn’t loathing. Promise me this, promise me that you’ll let me show you what we could be. We’re meant for more than just petty arguments, your grace.” Feeling as though his mouth has suddenly gone dry, he licks his lips, then takes her hand in one of his. “I won’t let this be just another business transaction between kingdoms, I’m going to make it mean something.”

She breathes heavily for a minute, but eventually, she nods, and he feels relief rush through him as she squeezes his hand. “I promise.”

“Then I must ask you, Rey Kenobi, if you will accept this ring, even if I should’ve given it to you weeks ago.”

Another laugh passes in the space between them, then she nods. “I do,” she says, another giggle escaping them both at the slight irony of her reply, then he takes her other hand, and slides the ring onto her finger, the tremor in his body finally seeming to subside once it rests comfortably on her hand. 

He does, however, shiver one last time at how right it feels to see the ring on her finger. A part of him wonders whether his mother will feel the same way, or his father. How will they feel when they see what Ben’s done? When they see that he’s put a ring on her finger? 

Thoughts of his parents, however, quickly pass when Rey places her other hand on his chin, forcing him to look at her again as a tiny smile makes itself known on her face. Before he can return it, a fresh jolt of adrenaline spikes through him as he suddenly finds himself being kissed within an inch of his life, the Duchess’s lips finding his in a kiss that’s messy and a little sloppy, their teeth clacking together a bit before he realizes what’s happening, and wraps an arm around her waist, pulling her to him as they find their rhythm, and the kiss becomes even.

They’re good at this, he realizes. She’s so in tune with him that every movement he makes, she’s matching it with no hesitation, there’s no awkward moment where he’s waiting for her to shift to meet him, because she shifts with him. They move together, in perfect harmony. 

She’s also smiling into the kiss, the first time he can recall her doing so--he allows for the possibility that it happened on the night of the dinner party--and he can’t help doing so in turn. His fiance may not be ready to admit it yet, but as she deepens the kiss, as his head bends back to allow her better access to his mouth, he knows what she feels for him. 

“I think the rain’s stopped,” he says after a couple of minutes, noticing that he can’t hear the sound of it pounding outside anymore as he pulls back, but only just enough to speak. He still hasn’t opened his eyes. 

“Oh, has it?”

“Yeah.”

“I think it still has a few minutes,” she says, then he giggles lightly as she kisses him again, and he becomes certain of his newest revelation. 

Rey loves him. She may have run, she may still be struggling to find the words, but he knows. She really does love him, and all that’s left now is for her to admit it. He just hopes he’ll hear it sooner rather than later. 


	8. In Sickness and in Health

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter count went up again entirely because of this completely self indulgent chapter.

Ben, of course, gets a cold. He’s sniffling when he returns home from his impromptu visit to Rey, and he’s feverish by morning. The castle doctor confirms it that afternoon, and as a result, Ben is placed on a twenty four hour bed rest, and his mother is enraged. 

His father, however, finds it hilarious, and he’s snickering in the background as the Queen rants on and on about how reckless he was and how he’s the kingdom’s only heir and her only son. Han, though, is smirking the entire time as he leans against Ben’s bedroom door, but there’s also a sympathetic edge to him as he looks at Ben, and gives him a knowing nod that suggests he knows exactly what his son is going through. 

It doesn’t help that he has a headache the size of the kingdom he will one day be the ruler of. He feels like he’s been hit by a carriage, but a very small one whose impact had been entirely on his cranium. That only makes the yelling worse, and eventually he manages to cut his mother off, silencing the tirade before she can properly give him hell. 

“Mother, I know,” he says, his voice a little weaker than he’d like it to be given the circumstances. “I know it was foolish, but things have changed between Rey and I, and I had to set something right.”

“What could have possibly been so bad, so desperate, that you were willing to risk a lightning strike to—?”

“I told her I loved her and she ran away before I could give her your ring.” It’s technically the truth. His mother doesn’t need to know about the sensual encounter that had preceded that confession. “I had to know, and Sir Poe—“

“You took advice from Poe Dameron?”

“And Armitage Hux.”

“And you thought that was _smart?_ ”

In hindsight, maybe it wasn’t, he thinks as he coughs up phlegm for the umpteenth time today, but then he remembers how good it had felt to kiss Rey until the rain stopped, to slide that ring on her finger, and promise himself to her forever. Oh, it was smart. Well, maybe not, but it was worth it. “No, but I do not regret doing so.”

“You are just like your father,” she mutters, then she steps back from the foot of his bed, coming around to his side before she takes one of his sweaty hands in hers. “I have some business I need to attend to unfortunately. I’ll come and check on you later, all right?”

“Yes, mother,” he replies, then she bends down, and presses a kiss to his forehead before he hears the sound of her heels clicking against the role of the floor, and she makes her way from the room, leaving him with his smirking father as she goes. 

The king is quick to laugh as he approaches Ben’s bed, sitting down casually on the side of it as he pats the side of his leg, and sighs. “Oh, you sure made her angry.”

“I just wanted—“

“I know, but even I should tell you, don’t do it again.”

“I had to know, father. I had to.”

“Was she worth it, Ben?”

“Yes.”

“Then that’s all that matters.” A small smile parts his father’s lips, then he bows his head. “I’m proud of you, you know.”

“I know.”

“I told you so, did I not?” he asks, that smirk making itself known again. “That things would change?”

A blush creeps up Ben’s cheeks. His stubborn pride doesn’t want to allow him to admit his father is right, but another part of him knows that what he’d said to him weeks earlier after his birthday is the truth. He would, and did, fall for his fiancé, and he is incredibly lucky to have done so. “Go away.”

Another laugh leaves his father, then he sets his hand down on the mattress, pushing himself back onto his feet as he looks down at his son. “Get some rest,” he says, then he pauses, his eyes falling on Ben’s desk on the other side of the room. “And perhaps you ought to write the duchess a letter.”

“A letter?” But his father is already making his way from the room, that shit-eating grin visible in the way he carries himself as he disappears through the door, then closes it gently behind him. 

Confusion fills him in the aftermath, but then his eyes fall on that desk, on the fountain pen he’d nearly worn out in all his attempts to write to her previously that had been ignored. He could write to her again. She’s likely to answer this time instead of simply ignoring him now that they have cleared things between them. Writing to her seems like an excellent idea, and so he disobeys his doctor’s orders to stay in bed, and gets up, his head swimming as he makes his way towards his desk. 

All his focus pours into keeping his eye on the prize, on getting to that pen and his paper, and getting back in bed. Somehow, he does it, though his vision blurs as he grabs hold of the pen, paper, and a book to bear down on. He feels light-headed and dizzy, but he makes it somehow, and falls down upon his mattress without any semblance of grace, a disgruntled groan escaping him as he adjusts himself, and manages to prop his back up against the pillows. 

Once he’s settled, the prince sets the book in his lap, then he lays the paper over it, wincing at the fresh ache the sound of its rustling brings him, and he begins to write a letter to the woman he’s going to marry. 

Dearest Rey,

  
I do not intend to alarm you with this letter, but unfortunately, it would seem there was one unintended consequence of my visit to your home yesterday afternoon. You see, allowing myself to become soaked in the freezing rain—

  
I’m just going to put it bluntly, there is no need for all of these formalities when the reality of the situation is this; I have fallen ill. Do not be alarmed, it is simply a mild fever and the doctor believes that I will make a full recovery in two days, well before our wedding.   
  
In all honesty, I mostly just wanted to inquire how you were feeling. I know that we left things in a much better place than they had been previously, but I must admit I have not been able to take my mind away from thoughts of you. Rey, you have consumed my very soul, and perhaps that is the fever talking, but it is how I feel. 

  
Hopefully by the time this letter reaches you, I will be well again, but regardless of what happens, I’ll keep you in my thoughts. You are my motivation to recover more quickly, to better myself so that by this time next week as we prepare for our wedding, this will have been forgotten.

  
Stay well, my love.

  
—Ben

Barely registering what he’s just written he giggles to himself as he folds the letter, placing it in an envelope he doesn’t bother to seal as he lays back against the headboard, allowing the letter and his pen to rest against his stomach. Slowly, his eyes flutter shut, and he tries to stay awake to summon the strength to call for one of the servants to mail his letter for him, but he’s fading fast. 

The fever burns anew through his body as he begins to drift off, completely oblivious to the world around him as he falls into sleep, and begins to dream of her smile. 

*

_She’s there with him, somehow, lying in his bed by his side, her hand spread out over his chest as she traces circles in the bare skin. He doesn’t remember taking off his clothes, but he’s naked now, and she’s clad only in her underthings, a corset and a petticoat, as she lays beside him, her eyes sweeping up and down the length of his body as she hums a waltz quietly._

_A part of him wonders how she got here, if this is real, then she lays a kiss on his shoulder, and_ fuck _, her lips feel so real, so soft and cool against his skin. His smile grows wide as she continues to hum as her lips leave a trail of kisses from his shoulder up to his pectorals, little bruises forming on his pale skin as she sucks it into her mouth._

_Soft little moans escape him as he realizes that this is heaven, this is paradise, and he’s found it._

_“Is this real?” he asks, his hands spreading out over her back as she grazes his nipple with her teeth. “Are you here?”_

_“Shhhh…” Her smile appears before him as she takes a break from peppering his body with kisses. “Don’t talk.”_

_“What if I enjoy talking with you?” he asks, his body shivering slightly as she straddles him. “What if I enjoy your company?”_

_Her hips roll over his, and he falls quiet as pleasure shoots through his body from his cock, his breathing stuttering as Rey leans down, and kisses him soundly on the mouth. Surprise fills him, but he welcomes it, welcomes any excuse he can find to kiss her as he suddenly finds himself surrounded by a halo of hair that is not his, and he realizes that for once, her hair is down._

_He wants to see it, see her like he never has before, but for now, he’s going to enjoy kissing her and bathe in that delightful, head spinning feeling that always accompanied such a feed. For a few more seconds, he loses himself, his hands twinning in the long, wavy locks of her hair, then he pulls back, and bites his lip, slowly releasing it as he takes a look at her._

Holy hell _, she’s beautiful—his fiancé is truly stunning, he thinks. She’s got a tiny braid wound around the crown of her head, but other than that, her hair cascades down her shoulders and falls somewhere by her breasts, held askew by the way the corset highlights her cleavage, but it’s a sight to behold. Ben might be the luckiest man alive, just because this is what he’s going to spend the rest of his days waking up to._

_“What are you doing?” she asks, then he chuckles softly, running his hands up and down her sides._

_“Your hair is down.”_

_“So?”_

_“I love it.”_

_“Ben, we’ve been married for five years,” she replies, then he freezes, blinking in horror that he would ever forget such a thing. His last memory is… he was sick in bed, wasn’t he? Yes, he was, and waking up without his memory, that didn’t just happen, did it?_

_“What?”_

_“You’re an idiot, but I love you,” she replies, then she’s kissing him again, and it occurs to him that this is a dream. None of what’s just happened is real. Either way, in this dream, he’s apparently been married to her for five years, and so he decides to enjoy it, and he grins into the kiss as he returns it with a passion, then rolls them over on the mattress, burying her beneath him as the sunlight grows brighter—_

A cool, damp cloth presses against his forehead, and he hums contentedly at the contact even as it pulls him from that wonderful dream. He feels good, still warm and fuzzy, and as his eyes flutter open, he feels a rush of delight pass through him as he follows the arm of the person who’s pressing a little cloth to his head and realizes that Rey is here. He isn’t just dreaming about her, she is real. 

She’s here. 

“Rey…”

“You keep saying that,” she replies, laughing softly to herself as she presses the towel to his forehead again, and he blinks in confusion. He hadn’t known she was here, and since when had she gotten here anyway? “I’m worried about you. Your parents said you’ve been like this for the past day.”

 _The past_ what?

“Every time you open your eyes I keep thinking maybe you’ve become lucid again, but then you start snoring a few seconds later. I think you must be dreaming,” she continues, her voice sounding almost sorrowful as she rests a hand on his cheek, and his eyelids become heavy with the effort of watching her. 

How long has he been like this? He remembers writing her a letter and thinking he would sleep for a few minutes at most, but now she is telling him he has been out for an entire day. The sun has set, risen, and from the looks of it, is preparing to set again all while he has been asleep. “A day?” he asks softly, then she pauses, seeming to not expect him to say anything aside from her name. 

“Ben?”

“I have been asleep for a day?”

A relieved rush of air escapes her, then suddenly he’s being crushed beneath her weight as she flings herself at him, her arms wrapping around his shoulders as she pulls him into an embrace. “Oh, Ben, thank god,” she breathes, warmth flooding the side of his neck as she buries her face in it, and her hands weave themselves in his hair. 

For a second, he is too shocked to move, then his arms wrap around her waist, and his eyes close again in sweet bliss as he holds her close, never wanting to let go. Why this is happening, he doesn’t know, but he’s eternally grateful for it. All he’s wanted from the moment he realized he loved her is a moment like this, where she’s holding him tightly and pressing sweet kisses to the column of his throat as she lies on top of him. “It—It’s good to see you too, your grace.”

“I was so worried. Your letter arrived this morning and I thought I would visit you, but then I arrived and your mother said you’d taken a turn, and—“ She sniffles against him. “Ben, I’ve been here all afternoon. I swore I wouldn’t leave until you got better, and even now I don’t want to.”

“Then don’t leave.” She pulls away from his neck then, allowing him to look into her eyes, to observe the sincerity and kindness in them as he finishes his thought. “Stay.”

“I can’t, it would be inappropriate, we are not yet wed.”

“Since when have we ever given a damn about whether or not something is appropriate?” he asks, seeing a flash of dappled sunlight and oak in his mind as she shakes her head at him, and he feels her fingers brush slowly over the skin of his cheeks. “You certainly haven’t.”

“Neither have you.”

Tiny laughter falls between them, then worry soon furrows his brow. “You shouldn’t be here, you could fall ill.”

All she does in response is cup his cheeks and shake her head. “You did the same for me. I’m sorry it wasn’t raining, but I still wanted to do the same for you.”

Still hardly able to believe it, his chest shudders on his next breath as he looks into her eyes, realizing for the first time since they’ve started talking that his fireplace has been lit, the light flickering warmly on her face as she looks down at him, and suddenly he realizes what she hadn’t been able to say the other day. He already knows it, but the truth of it hits him anew as he begins rubbing circles into her back, calming them both as he realizes she really does love him. “That’s all right.”

“And I do believe that it is written in the vows we must take that we be there for one another in sickness and in health.” She begins pressing the cloth to his forehead again. “As much as I tried to deny it I care for you deeply, and we are past the point of pretending, so I’m going to stay, for however long you will have me, and you are going to let me care for you.”

Another shiver passes through him as the severity of her promise, which is a vow in and of itself, settles in. Just a month ago they had still sworn they hated one another, and he’d thought there was a chance he might’ve been falling for her, but he hadn’t known what love was back then. Now he knows, now he’s certain of what he feels, he’s more confident, sure that he loves her and that they have grown. 

The prince and the duchess are no longer the two idiotic, disagreeable fools they had once been, they have matured, blossomed into something better. Adulthood has allowed them to finally heal the animosity between them, to form this relationship that makes them feel safe around each other, that drives the two to be willing to do anything for the other. 

They’ve gone from shouting matches and pulling one another into ponds to caring for one another when they’re sick. It’s now that he realizes their marriage will actually work, and he finds himself forever grateful that he’d never been able to find another match before he’d turned twenty one—perhaps because his match had been right in front of him all along. 

Rey turns away after a moment, and he briefly mourns the loss of her warmth as she bends to dip the cloth back in cool water. All he can do is watch her move, his attention catching on the lack of gloves on her hands, the concentrated look on her face, and the deep blue of her gown as she rings the fabric out. He’s entranced, and he never wants to come out of his hypnotic state, except, of course, he can’t do this forever. 

“How did you get my parents to leave?” he asks, his eyes closing as she presses the cloth against his head once more. “My mother always refuses to leave my bedside when I’m ill.”

She laughs softly to herself, then her free hand cups his cheek. “I told her I would shout if I needed anything, but I think she understood that you and I needed this, that we needed as much time to heal from all those years of fighting as we could get. We couldn’t just wait for the wedding to come and pass.” The cloth is pressed to the side of his head by his temple, and as he moans his satisfaction, Rey shivers slightly around him. He can feel it in the tiny little tremor of her hand. “And now that you’re awake again, we have the chance.”

The corners of his mouth twitch. “I dreamt of you,” he admits, recalling the little vision his mind had conjured for him while he was out. “I dreamt that you were here, but it wasn’t quite like this.”

“Oh?” She presses the cloth against his warm cheek. “What was it like then?”

His eyes close, a grin patting his lips as he recalls the feeling of holding her close, of feeling the minimal layers between them. She’d been extraordinary there, her gaze so soft, her hands so tender and loving, kind of like they are now. “You were holding me,” he tells her, his voice almost a whisper. “I had you in my arms, and you were so…”

For a moment, his train of thought escapes him, then she smoothes back his hair, fingernails grazing his scalp gently as she looks down at him with the same kindness in her eyes that she’d had when he’d been dreaming. “I was so—what, Ben?”

“Perfect. You were in your under things, your hair was down, I think we’d just woken up, and you were kissing me.” He manages another laugh as his hands come up to hold her waist, his fingers nearly wrapping all the way around it as he watches her face slowly melt from its previously composed concern. “I wondered why you were here, and you told me that was ridiculous.”

“Why was it ridiculous?”

“According to you, we had been married for five years.”

Blinking, Rey sets the cloth down on his bedside table, placing one hand on his chest, and the other on his cheek as she leans in toward him. “Five years?” she asks softly. “And we were happy?”

“It wasn’t real.”

“But you wanted it to be?”

He pauses, realizing that she’s asking him this because she’s trying to be sure that they’re on the same page. It’s sweet, he thinks, and also remarkable. Gone are the days of endless misunderstandings between them, and here is the new phase of their lives in which they are finally in sync, in which they are orbiting around one another without fear of some violent collision. “I do. I want that. I’d want it ten, twenty, thirty, or however many years we’ll be blessed with on this earth.” 

All she gives him in response is a nod, then she leans closer, her body shielding his from the light of the fire, which casts a warm glow around her as she gives him one last smile. “Good,” she says, then she’s kissing him again, and his dream—a part of it at least—comes true. 

At first, he is unsure of whether he should kiss her back or pull away. She could fall ill herself by kissing him, and the last thing they need is to put them both through this, but it feels so good, and if she is going to get his illness, she’ll probably get it just from taking care of him anyway. 

It takes him very little time to make up his mind after that, his arms wrapping around her waist as he kisses her back, pulling her close against him as her weight presses into his chest. His heart is pounding the entire time as he feels Rey settle over it, and it’s honestly a wonder that she doesn’t manage to fall off from how hard it’s hammering against his bones, but somehow, she stays in place, and a kiss that makes his already dizzy head spin ensues. 

Kissing her is the closest thing he will ever find to heaven, he thinks. It’s the closest he will ever be to knowing true peace, though since he’d given her his mother’s ring, he hasn’t exactly been at war with himself, even if he’s been ill through most of the time that has passed since. He can feel that ring now, the silver band resting on his cheek as she adjusts her hand against his face so that she’s tilting his head back, allowing her to deepen the kiss as he sinks into the pillows. 

His cold, of course, prevents him from breathing in as much oxygen as he normally gets, and so within a few seconds, he starts fighting off the urge to gasp for air, but even as he pulls away, he still feels absolutely wonderful, almost as if he is flying. Perhaps he is and this is all just another fever dream. “Sorry,” he manages to pant out, his chest heaving hard enough to move them both as she laughs at him. “Can’t breathe.”

“No, it’s all right,” she assured him. “I should have waited until you were better. We have a wedding coming soon anyway.”

“And I was supposed to wait to kiss you until the wedding?” He shakes his head, leaning forward as another smile parts his lips. “Never.”

She pushes back on his chest. “You’re supposed to wait on everything until the wedding.”

“Ah, pot, why must you call the kettle black?” he asks, earning himself a solid smack on the chest. “Ow.”

“Idiot,” she mutters, but then she’s kissing him again, and even if this second kiss is much more brief than the first, it’s still magical. 

It’s almost criminal that he cannot respond to it properly, that he must allow her to pull away after only two seconds pass, but something tells him that even if he could breathe right, they would’ve had to part anyway. 

Not long after the kiss ends, the door to his chambers opens, and without warning, his father steps into the room, the sound of his footsteps causing Rey to shoot away from him at a speed bullets can only strive to achieve. “Your majesty,” she says, bowing her head slightly as she stands. 

“At ease, your grace,” his father replies, but there’s a hint of a smirk on his face, suggesting he knows precisely what has just happened. “The doctor just needs a moment with my son.”

Disappointment causes both of their shoulders to slump. “Oh.”

“I’ll tell him you need a moment,” the King assures them, then he looks at his son. “Say your goodbyes. We should send the Duchess home before nightfall.” And before they can say anything else, his father leaves, shutting the door behind him as Rey turns to face him once more. 

Saying nothing, he holds out his hand for her, his fingers unfolding as he awaits the moment in which she will fill the open space on his skin with her palm. Luckily, he doesn’t have to wait long. She places her hand in his the second she sees it, sitting down on the edge of his mattress as she strokes his cheek with the back of her hand, the diamond on her ring scraping gingerly against his skin as she then places her hand on the line of his jaw. “I’m sorry,” she says. “For everything.”

“I know.”

“Ben, I—“

He puts a finger over her lips, then smiles slightly. “Don’t tell me that now, I can’t promise I’ll remember it.” Then he takes hold of the hand caressing him, and presses a kiss to the backs of her fingers, his lips placed right over her ring. “I want to remember when you tell me. I certainly remember when I told you.”

They both laugh at this, then Rey nods. “I will wait then,” she says, adjusting her grip on his hand. “And you focus on getting better. I don’t want you coughing up phlegm on our wedding night.”

“That would be rather arousing, wouldn’t it?” His voice is laced with a thick layer of sarcasm, but Rey still looks briefly alarmed before she shakes her head at his joke. “Do you think I could still make you come like I did last summer if I was coughing up phlegm and had a low fever?”

“Ben!” she cries, but she’s fighting back giggles as she speaks, and throwing her arms around his shoulders not a second later. He can even feel her smiling against his neck as she holds him tight, almost as if she doesn’t want to let go. 

His father said he’d give them a moment, and so Ben wraps his arms around her, burying his face in her hair—well, some of it anyway, it’s tied back in those three buns of hers—breathing her in as she does the same to him. He can’t smell good, he hasn’t bathed in two days now and he’s been sweating out a fever, but she doesn’t complain. At least she smells wonderful, whatever perfume she’d put on before leaving Kenobi’s manor makes him think of summertime and butterflies, flowers and sunshine, and a world far away from misery. 

This will be his life. There will be love in his marriage, there will be light, something happy that he can look forward to on even the darkest of his nights. He finds himself filling with excitement and hope, remembering how when this engagement had begun, he’d feared they’d spend their days struggling to tolerate one another. 

He isn’t sure exactly when the change between them occurred, when they finally stopped loathing one another and then just became shit at communicating it, but he likes to think that the first kiss she’d given him last summer, the first effort she’d made to shut him up had been a leading cause. Without that, would they be where they are now? Would they eventually have caved the same way?

There’s no way of knowing, but he likes to think that in spite of all their bickering and fighting, they somehow would’ve ended up here in one another’s arms. 

Eventually, she pulls away, her hands cupping his cheeks as her tongue comes out to wet her lips, and she nods. “I’ll keep you in my thoughts.”

Something tells him she means something else entirely, though. He can see it in her eyes, those hazel irises giving away all the words she’s not saying, but they allow him to catch her true meaning as she leans forward, and presses a kiss to his unfortunately sweaty forehead. If she notices how slick it is, she doesn’t comment, she simply lets her lips linger there for a couple of seconds before she pulls away, allowing him to look her in the eyes. “And I’ll keep you in mine.”

She kisses him again on the lips, short and sweet, then she pulls back, resting her hand gently on his thigh as she stands up, and squeezes the muscle there once before she moves away, and gestures to the door. “I’ll let the doctor get to it.”

“I wish you didn’t have to.”

“I’ll see you soon, your highness,” she says, then she makes her way from the room before he can say his last goodbye, leaving him still feeling thoroughly dizzy and kiss drunk when the doctor comes in a second later. 

The entire time he’s being taken care of, he barely registers the doctor’s commands. All he knows is the feeling of Rey’s lips on his, and the certainty that one day, this will be how he spends every morning, that he will be kissed again, and he will never again need to fear the feeling of being alone. 


	9. Ceremony

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey gang, this chapter was a struggle bus, but I pulled through. Hope everyone’s doing okay 💖

On his wedding day, Prince Ben Solo is in the finest suit he’s ever worn. Formalwear, the heaviest of all fabrics, has never weighed more. Yet as he fastens the buttons on his coat, as he adjusts the cravat around his neck, his eyes focused on his hands in a tall mirror’s reflection, he finds the weight is easy to bear.

In the near two weeks since Rey had visited his bedside, he’s been writing to her daily, and she writes to him in turn. They’re mostly just inquiring as to the other’s well being, but the gesture is appreciated nonetheless. It’s good practice for when they are actually married, for how they will maintain their relationship when they are parted.

Dearest, Ben,

I hope you are well. I’ve thought of you daily since the last time I saw you, but though you have been writing to me, I haven’t been sure of your recovery. Today’s letter, I suppose, is merely an inquiry as to your wellbeing.

Somehow, I’ve grown to care about you very deeply. I’m not quite sure how you managed that, but you are incredibly important to me as you well know from my visit a few days ago. I know you requested that I refrain from saying those words you feared you wouldn’t remember while you were sick, but if I can, I would like to tell you them in my next letter.

Sending you my love,  
Rey.

That letter had made him unable to hide his smile when he read it over breakfast. Both of his parents had refused to stop teasing him after, to the point where he ran from the room ahead of the end of the meal to write his reply.

He could handle their teasing, really, he could, but what he couldn’t handle was waiting another second to assure her he was all right.

  
Dear Rey,

Thank you for your inquiry as to my well being. After a couple of days of drinking teas I have no desire to know the contents of, I am delighted to announce that I am feeling better. I am not sure how, but I have managed to pull through the worst of the fever.

I’d like to think you helped me with it. Within hours after you left I felt less foggy, there was certainly a significant improvement. I know by the time we walk down the aisle, it will be as if nothing ever happened.

If you ever need me to do the same for you, I won’t hesitate. If I somehow made you fall ill in turn, I will ride to you on horseback again in an instant. I won’t, however, do so in the rain again. I learned a lesson from that, I think.

With every day that passes, I look forward to seeing you again, and I hope you are doing well.

I’ll see you at our wedding.

Love,  
Ben.

That wedding is in a little more than an hour, and the prince had thought he’d be nervous, but much to his surprise, he’s ready. Two months ago, when this had first been proposed, he hadn’t ever thought he would be, but he is. He’s more than ready. He’s almost even looking forward to it, if only because he knows at the end of it, he gets to kiss her when he wants to. Well, more than that, he gets to make love to her without it being some sort of forbidden, shameful secret.

Tonight, he’s probably going to see all of her for the first time, and that alone sends a shiver down his spine. He has seen her at her most debauched, her most wonton and lust-driven moments, but to have nothing between them?

She is going to see him, too, and _oh_ , if that doesn’t make him gulp.

The door to his chambers opens, the sound louder than a gunshot, and a second later, his father walks in, a knowing smirk on his face as if he can somehow read his son’s mind. A blush coats Ben’s cheeks, he desperately does not want his father to know what he’s been thinking. “Good afternoon, father.”

“Good afternoon, Ben,” he replies, walking further into the room as the door shuts behind him, the layers of his coats rustling quietly as he makes his way to his son. “How are you feeling?”

“Nervous. Is it possible for a groom to faint?”

“Contrary to what society will tell you, son, men can most definitely faint just as easily as women can.” Concern furrows his brow as he looks at him through the reflection of the mirror. “Perhaps you should sit down.”

“No, no, I am fine now, I’m worried about later.” He clears his throat. “When we are in the chapel and she walks down the aisle.”

“She’ll just be an ocean of white until you lift the veil, Ben.”

That didn’t make him any less nervous. “Perhaps.”

“I was nervous the day I married your mother.” He laughs as he walks further into the room. “I can’t recall a day since in which I’ve had as much anxiety.”

Soft laughter falls from his lips as he adjusts the sleeves of his jacket . “What did you do?”

“I don’t know. I just figured she was probably as scared as I was if not more, and one of us had to at least pretend to be brave.” Han then lays a hand on his son’s shoulder, looking surprisingly serious as their eyes meet. “If you look as if you know what you’re doing, it gets easier.”

Ben’s mouth shifts, but then he nods, and he turns his gaze on his reflection once more. “Did you come in here to check on my wellbeing, or—?”

“Not entirely,” his father says, producing an envelope from the pocket of his coat as he speaks. “One more letter arrived for you at sunrise. It’s from your fiancé.”

His eyes go wide at that. “You didn’t open it, did you?”

“No, Ben, I have no desire to pry into your relationship with the Duchess.”

A fresh wave of heat fills his cheeks, then he turns, taking the envelope from his father’s hands before he steals a moment to just stare at the Jakku crest stamped on it by his fiancé. For a few seconds, he and his father stand like that in silence, then his eyes flicker upward, observing that the king is standing there staring at him with his arms crossed over his chest, almost as if he’s waiting for him to open the letter. “Father, I thought you said you had no interest in prying.”

“Oh, I—right,” Han mutters awkwardly, stuttering over himself a couple of times as he makes his way from his son’s chambers. He watches him as he goes, shaking his head at the knowing smirk on his father's lips—one which he’d inherited—as he closed the door behind him.

Only once he’s completely alone does Ben dare to open the letter, his overgrown fingers fumbling foolishly with the paper as he hurries to free the letter inside. Excitement floods his veins when it’s finally out, finally free, and he hurriedly unfolds it, barely breathing as he begins to read whatever it is that Rey has sent him on their wedding day.

Dearest, Ben,

By the time you read this, there is a good chance we’ll already have finished the ceremony and the celebration and gone to our quarters for the evening. Perhaps if that is the case, we could read this together, but if not, I wanted to write to you anyway.

It has been too many days to count since I saw you last, but I understand we will soon be together far more frequently, and as a result, I thought there were a few things you ought to know about me given that our friendship is still new and we don’t actually know much about each other yet.

My favorite color is blue, it makes me think of the sky, the lake, the halo around your hair when we slipped our chaperone last summer, and the suit you wore to your birthday gala. I think yours is black, but I can only assume as we have never had a conversation such as this.

I also happen to have a deep passion for reading, which, if I am to understand correctly, you seem to share. Your mother told me before you arrived at your party that it was something I should know. I dismissed it at the time, since you and I were still determined to loathe one another, but now I hope we can make it a hobby to share the things we read and discover. I feel as if that may help us in our attempts to strengthen the connection we share.

I ought to leave a few mysteries for our marriage, so I’ll end it there, but I did want to offer one last apology for all of the years I’ve been so unkind to you. I know I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again and again until I actually start to feel as if I’ve made up for everything. You are quite likely to hear this again from me later.

Dusk is falling, and I should attempt to get some rest before the insanity tomorrow will bring, so I shall see you in the afternoon, your highness, and if you would be so kind as to keep me from fainting in front of all our guests, that would be much appreciated.

Sending all my love,  
Rey

His heart swells as he reads the letter, holding it close to his chest as he finds himself comforted by the fact that she is just as nervous, just as scared, as he is. The words his father had spoken to him moments earlier come to his mind, and he realizes what he must now do.

Bravery, however false, is now a front he must project outward, giving off the impression to all the eyes that will be on him today that he fears nothing. He cannot let a soul know that on the inside, he is screaming, both for his sake and for Rey’s. To the rest of the world, he will be completely neutral, nothing will be given away, and he will appear perfectly composed and put together.

The sole person who will ever know he’s at war with himself is him. Technically, his father knows, too, but he won’t tell anyone a thing. Maybe his mother knows, but the Queen has, he suspects, the ability to read minds, so even if his father doesn’t tell her, she’ll see it written on his face plain as day.

She probably also knows precisely what he’d done when he got back from his trip with Rey last year. He can remember how he felt when he stepped out of the carriage, when he’d gone inside and his parents had tried to confront him. He’d turned twenty, but right then he was every bit the arrogant, bitter teenager he’d been just months prior.

His mood had never been quite so fowl, and when his mother attempted to speak to him, he’d felt as if the grimace on his face told her everything she needed to know as he slammed the door on her face.

Now, though, as he folds her letter and places it on his desk, Ben feels lighthearted and fuzzy, but then he squares his shoulders, his body straightening as he looks at the door, knowing that soon she’ll be there, in the castle, and…

Shaking all those thoughts from his head, he makes his way out of the room, and heads towards the far wing, feeling unexpectedly light as he walks out of the room, and into the hall, walking at a steady pace toward his future, to _Rey._

*

The hall his parents had elected to hold the wedding in looked magnificent, to say the least. The crest of Alderaan was hung on one side, and jakku’s was on the other. Flowers with purple petals lined the walls, gathered on the seats where people have already gathered. The knights and all of the nobility are already sitting, and he’s waiting at the end of the aisle looking at it all, feeling thoroughly overwhelmed as he awaits the moment in which the doors will open at the other end of the hall, and she will walk down here and meet him.

His parents are in the first row, along with Rey’s family. This mostly consists of her distant cousins, seeing as her father is the one who will be walking her down the aisle any minute now. There’s maybe a few dozen people here in all, but it’s still far too many witnesses.

All of a sudden, his nerves feel wrangled again, and even though nothing has happened yet, he wants to tear off all of the layers that are wearing him down. Pure fear is running through his veins, and suddenly he feels like he wants to run, like he can’t do this, but then the doors open, and soft music plays from a quartet on the far side of the room as his eyes find themselves drawn to the light spilling into the chapel.

She walks in while he’s in the middle of taking a breath, and he chokes on air as he sees her. Rey’s face isn’t visible, it’s hidden by the sheer lace of a veil, but he can still see her silhouette through it, the slightly puffy sleeves that end just past her shoulders, the ribbon wrapped around her waist, the gentle swell of her breasts--

He needs to stop thinking about those in front of everyone. He’s a prince, she’s a duchess, and this is their wedding day. This is technically just official business, but he can’t help looking at her and thinking he’s lucky.

 _If you look as if you know what you are doing, it gets easier,_ his father’s voice says in his head, and his mouth shifts one last time as he watches her walk in, the eyes of everyone in the room turn to her, and briefly, the pressure is removed from him, making it easier to find her eyes, and give her a nod, a tiny signal that everything will be all right.

As she gets closer, Ben can see the quiver in her lip through the lace, the shine of some sort of little pink pigment glistening with every tiny shake, and by the time he’s stepping down to hold out his arm for her, to accept her from her father--which feels foolish, but this isn’t the time to defy customs--he knows that somehow, he’s become the calmer of the two.

The King of Jakku’s face is impassive, unreadable. If he knows that either his granddaughter or soon to be grand-son in law are terrified out of their wits, he says nothing. He’s not a man Ben knows well either. Both of his parents adore the king, but he only knows his granddaughter. They’ve never held a full conversation by themselves.

He supposes that will change soon.

Rey’s hand grasps his arm, her fingers wrapped around his bicep as he leads her back up onto the altar. It’s the tightest she’s ever grabbed him, and he places his hand over hers, squeezing gently in a way he hopes is reassuring.

“Thank you,” she whispers quietly, then they’re on the altar, his hands releasing hers before he reaches for the lace of her veil, his heart pounding as he lifts the fabric, and tosses it back over her head.

The moment her face is visible, his heart stops beating. Her lips are tinged just the slightest bit more pink than normal, her cheeks flushed, but he can’t tell if that is from any sort of cosmetic or if she is genuinely just blushing that hard. He thinks he might be too as he takes her hands in his, though all he wants to do at the moment is cup those cheeks in his palms, and kiss her.

That will have to wait a minute, though. First, they have to get through their vows.

His uncle, the man assigned to marry them, commences his speech, and with the hand the audience can’t see, Ben begins to gently stroke the back of Rey’s thumb, his eyes searching hers in a way he hopes lets her know she’s going to be all right.

“I’m scared,” she whispers to him through a closed jaw. “There are so many people.”

“Shh… I’m right here,” he whispers back, then he straightens. “Let’s just get through these vows, then it will just be us. You and I. No one else.”

“No one else.”

“Just us.”

They fall quiet then, and Ben’s uncle begins to lead them through the vows, and the only words he speaks are his promises to care for her through the remainder of their days. The entire time, his eyes never leave hers. Even when they are being handed rings, even when he’s sliding it onto her finger, even when she does the same to him, he never looks away.

By the time things start to draw to a close, they’re both breathing evenly. They’re at least calm, and as his uncle speaks the last words before they finally seal it all together, Ben takes a chance to whisper to her one last time. “I love you.”

Shock jolts her, he can see the slight tremble in her body as she nods, but then before she can tell him, he’s saying, “I do.”

A soft laugh falls from her lips, then she nods as their officiate prompts her to say the same. “I do.”

He barely waits to be given permission. The last word is leaving Lando’s mouth when Ben leans in, and kisses his wife soundly on the lips.

This marriage was arranged, set between them by law, but it feels genuine, feels right to kiss her, and suddenly he understands why he could never find anyone else prior to his twenty first birthday deadline. There had never been anyone else, she had always been right there in front of him, and they were both just so stupid. They were _blind._

Their fate, their destiny, it felt like, was always leading here, to this, to the kiss they’re sharing at this altar. Sure, it’s just supposed to be a business transaction, but he’s gotten lucky, hasn’t he? He has become one of the rare few of all people like them who has somehow, miraculously, found a connection with the person that his duty has decreed he is fit to marry.

He’d never kissed anyone before her last summer, when she pressed him into a tree, but he knows no one else would kiss him like she does. Even this kiss, chaste, close-mouthed and short because it would be inappropriate otherwise, makes him think there must be a way for science to prove that some sort of heaven is real. Or maybe it’s this.

Maybe he has found it right here on Earth.

In spite of everything, societal convention and what they’re supposed to do, he kisses her for a little longer than he should, just wanting to feel her lips on his for a few more seconds. Sure, he is going to be with her in a few hours, and they will have the entire night to themselves, but it isn’t enough. He wants her _now._ He needs her _now._

Fighting back against the urgency he’s feeling, Ben slowly pulls away, his eyes blinking open as applause fills the room. She’s blinking back at him, both of them looking thoroughly shaken as they pull back, their eyes still locked only on each other. His chest for some reason, is heaving, and even as they finally retreat back to where they started, he’s still struggling to breathe.

He’s just married her. He married Rey, and now it’s real. She is his wife, not some princess he hardly knows--though he supposes, through this, she is technically a princess--but her, the woman he’s feuded with since he was thirteen. This is who he has married, this is who he has somehow managed to tie himself to until the day he dies.

Laughter falls from her lips, interrupting his train of thought, and suddenly, he is being pulled into a warm embrace. They are still in front of everyone, still standing at the altar, but Rey wraps her arms around his waist, and rests her chin upon his shoulder. It’s technically inappropriate, but then she whispers into his ear, her lips grazing over the waves covering his skin, and he feels a renewed sense of peace. “I love you, too,” she says, then they pull back, and she nods. “I mean it.”

A broad grin parts the corners of his mouth, then he takes her hand in his, and they begin their descent away from the aisle. Again he can feel all the eyes in the room on them, but neither of them seem to want to acknowledge it as they walk arm and arm out of the chapel and into the ballroom. “Were you just waiting to say that until the wedding or did it not hit you until just now?”

“It hit me the second you left my home when you came in the rain,” she admits, then she squeezes his arm, and a smile like sunshine fills his gaze. “I should have stopped you when you left and told you then, but I think of the two of us, you are better at the grand gestures.”

“Am I now?”

“I wanted to tell you when I was taking care of you, too. You wouldn’t let me.”

More soft laughter fills the air, then he nods. “I remember.”

“Good,” she replies, then they leave the room, clinging tightly to one another as they make their way into the ballroom. They have a second dance to share, after all.

*

Rey’s veil has gone missing. He doesn’t know where it is, but somewhere between all of the wine and the brandy he’s lost track of time. This ball isn’t quite as organized and refined as the last. Yes, overall the behavior of the room is polite and proper, but everyone in the room is just a touch to the left of tipsy, and even the waltzes are starting to take on a sloppy, disorganized structure.

It’s not something he notices much at all, but that has nothing to do with the alcohol. It has everything to do with the woman in his arms, the smile on her face, and the gentle music accompanying them as they dance on the center of the ballroom floor.

“Remember the last time you were drunk?” she asks him as he twirls her around, and both of them slowly become dizzy. Maybe the alcohol is affecting them.

“I unfortunately don’t remember much of it,” he replies, pulling her in close so that he can whisper in her ear. “But I do remember being kissed.”

“I kissed you goodnight, you know.”

He’s staring at her lips again as she admits it, his eyes helplessly drawn to them as she speaks. All he wants to do is kiss her again, but it wouldn’t be proper, they both know it. Even married couples have to show restraint. He’s already made a fool of himself at the ceremony, kissing her a little longer than he should have.

But he doesn’t remember that kiss. As much as he wants to, he can’t remember it. “You did?”

“The carriage pulled in the front of my grandfather’s manor,” she tells him, and vaguely in his memory he can recall the flickering of her porch lights as she laid a gentle hand on his face. “And you were so out of it…”

Slowly, it starts coming to him. He remembers being helped to their carriage, he remembers holding her hand, the little conversations they had, and oh, he remembers being kissed, the soft feeling of her lips on his, that sweet feeling of being held, if only for a moment...  
_“Ben, I’m going to leave now,” she tells him, and his sleepy, drunken mind doesn’t quite understand it. Where is she going? Why can't she stay? “I didn’t want to alarm you by leaving before you woke.”  
Oh, that’s nice of her, he thinks, but why can’t she stay?  
He reaches out for her hand as she begins to move toward the door again, catching it just before she can pull on the handle. “Don’t go, your grace.”  
The Duchess’ cheeks turn pink, or at least, they seem to in the low light. “We don’t live together yet, Ben, I can’t stay.”  
“Do you want to?” he slurs softly, his fingers toying gently with the satin of her glove as his eyes start to shut again. He wants them to be open. God, why can’t he keep them open?  
Regret fills him as they close, and Rey falls silent, but he can hear her breath catch ever so slightly as she leans closer to him, tightening her grip on his hand as he starts fading into unconsciousness.  
There’s a gentle press of lips against his, and it takes him far too long to register that she’s kissing him, that she’s just kissed him completely unprompted and without looking for a reason to shut him up. She’s kissing him for a reason that he doesn’t understand, and it wakes him up for a half-second of blissful awareness as she then pulls away, leaving him stunned as she opens the carriage door. “Goodnight, your highness,” she says, then she’s gone, the carriage door shutting behind her as Ben stares flabbergasted at where she’d just stood, his fingers coming up to touch his lips as the carriage speeds away from the Kenobi household, and on towards his home._  
“I remember,” he breathes, his entire body shivering as the memory becomes fresh in his mind. “I didn’t want you to go. I wanted you to come home with me.”

“You hated me.”

He shakes his head. “I didn’t.” Then he’s giggling softly to himself. “I… I think that night was the first time I was honest with myself about how I felt.”

The woman in his arms--his _wife_ \--begins to pull away, taking his hands in hers as he watches an idea form in her eyes. Curiosity blooms within him, but before he can comment on it, she looks back at the window, staring out at the setting sun as it disappears beneath the horizon. Ben follows her gaze, realizing what it means.

Nightfall. Their wedding day is slowly becoming their wedding _night_. Well, not slowly. It’s rather quick, but still, he knows that soon they’ll be free to leave the room, and he-- _fuck_ \--he will be able to take her to his chambers and they will be allowed to finally consummate their marriage.

“Ben, I think we have entertained this party for long enough,” Rey tells him, causing his heart to start pumping blood at a pace that’s so fast, he can’t breathe. “Everyone here knows what happens next.”

“Are--are you suggesting what I think you are suggesting?” He is pretty certain he knows, but he has to be sure, he has to hear it from her lips one more time.

Nodding eagerly, she beams at him again, then she takes hold of his hand, her tone growing serious as she steps closer to him. “Ben, I--If I’m being honest, I’ve been wanting this since what happened last year. When we were in the carriage, that was--” She scoffs, seeming to throw propriety to the wind as she looks at him. “That was incredible, but I need--I need to just--”

“I know,” he replies, and god, he can’t help remembering how it felt to be inside of her, how badly he has craved that feeling since. “Are you suggesting we--”

“Go?”

“Yes.”

She lights up again, brighter than he’d ever thought possible, and begins tugging on his hand, leading him away from the floor as he feels a swirl of dizziness rush through his body that he knows has nothing to do with the wine he’s drunk. “What are we waiting for, your highness?”

Snorting his amusement, he lets her lead him out of the room. If anyone watches him, he doesn’t care. He doesn’t notice, he’s completely oblivious to everything but Rey. “Lead the way, your grace,” he tells her, knowing full well that isn’t technically her proper form of address anymore, but not giving a shit. He’ll probably call her his grace even when they take the throne of Alderaan.

What he calls her, though, aside from her name, won’t matter tonight. All that matters is that finally, they are alone, and they have gotten over all of the things that have held them back from becoming what they were meant to be. After all this time, they are at peace, and Ben can’t wait to see where they go from here, starting with the bedroom upstairs, and the night they have ahead of them.


	10. Wedding Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW for a brief discussion of having kids toward the middle of the chapter. That's not going to be a part of this fic, but it does get mentioned.

Once he has her in his chambers, he briefly considers pressing her against the wall and having her then and there. Instead, he takes her face in his hands, and for a couple of seconds, he just admires her. 

A fire has been lit in his fireplace, the light flickering over her features, as she looks at him with that same sort of curiosity that he knows, must be in his. It makes his heart start beating unhealthily fast in his chest, like it had when he’d been ill, and his breathing grows ragged as he watches her reach up with her gloved hand, and press the white satin to his face. 

The prince’s eyes shut involuntarily as her thumb brushes over his lips. He wonders what this feels like to her, how it must be to touch someone through fabric the way she’s touching him. Can she still feel his warmth like this? Can she feel his joy? The little tremor he knows is shaking him with each breath he takes? He will never know how much the satin takes away, but he wants to be sure she feels everything. 

He wants to feel everything, too. 

“Ben,” she whispers as his hand covers hers, smothering her small fingers with his much larger ones as he watches her jaw fall slack. 

All he does is smirk as he wraps his fingers around hers, as he takes that hand away from his face, and pinches the edge of one of the satin fingertips between two of the fingers of his other hand. Focusing his vision, he pulls it free from her hand and forearm as she watches him with bated breath. Neither of them makes a sound until the glove is free from her body, both exhaling nervously as they hear the fabric crumple to the ground. 

The first item of clothing to be removed tonight must be these gloves, he’s decided.

As soon as the first glove hits the ground, he begins his work on the second, moving no faster on this one than he had on the first as he punches the tip between his fingers, and slowly tugs forth until the second glove falls to the floor. 

She’s free now, her hands beautifully bare as they rest at her sides, longing to be held. Feeling more than happy to fulfill her desire, Ben takes hold of them, fingers wrapping around her palms as she does the same to him, their hands held in the space between them, at the height of her chest, and for a tiny fraction of time, they just stand there staring at their joined hands. 

By god, he hates gloves. If he could, he would make a royal decree stating that gloves were to be banned. Rey has beautiful hands—they’re soft, warm, and made to fit with his. He wants to just stand there holding them forever, but this is their wedding night, and he wants to see more than just her bare hands. 

Blinking himself from his stupor, he begins to take steps backwards, tugging gently on her hands to encourage her to follow. “We should go to bed.”

“You’re probably right,” she replies, her voice quiet. 

The fire roared in his ears as he leads her over to the mattress, and sat down on the edge, releasing one of her hands to allow her the space to sit down beside him as she lifts her skirts, and together they sit there on the edge of his bed watching the flames dance. His hands find hers once more, taking her right hand in his and bringing it forth to his lips. Kisses plant themselves over her palm, from the bases of her fingers to the heel by her wrist, he brushes his lips over her skin in delicate little touches that cause his new wife to close her eyes in anticipation. 

“This isn’t going to be like last summer,” he promised her, placing a kiss over the pulse point on her wrist. “We don’t have to move as if we’re running out of time anymore.” Another one is pressed over the center of her forearm, and she sighs against him as she leans closer. “This time…” He presses one to the crook of her elbow. “I’m going to do it slowly. I’m going to take off every piece of your clothing as if it’s a study. You’re an academic, are you not? I like to think we have that in common.” 

As he presses a kiss to her shoulder, she swallows. “We do.” Then she moans, a quiet, breathy little sound that resembles music in his ears as she bends her arm, her hand cupping the back of his head. “And I plan on taking my time with you as well, your highness.”

A snicker leaves him, wicked and a little devious as the fingers of his other hand reach for the lowest of her three buns. “I think I will start with these.” He takes hold of the first ribbon tying her hair back, his fingers making quick work of the knot keeping it together. 

Within seconds he’s rewarded by the ribbon falling down her back to his mattress, her hair falling in brunette waves over the back of her neck as he presses another kiss to the side of it. The instant it’s undone, he kisses her higher up on the column of her throat, his fingers reaching for the ribbon on the second bun all the while. More loose tresses coat his fingers as she holds him close, her body falling limp against his as he kisses her just beneath her jaw, his lips ghosting over her skin as his fingers make their way toward the third and final bun in her hair. 

As he tugs on that last ribbon, his deft fingers making quick work of it, he kisses her on the cheek. Rey, however, thwarts this plan as it’s in action. Instead of meeting her cheek, his lips meet hers, and he’s kissing her properly as the last of her three buns falls loose onto her shoulders, and his hand sinks deep into her hair as she kisses him thoroughly, her lips moving against his in near perfect synchrony. 

It makes him tremble to think of how this feels compared to what had happened a year ago. Back then, they’d been frenzied, hurried, and a little rushed. It had been awkward and passionate, and undoubtedly the most sensual moment of Ben’s life—up until now at least. 

This moment, right here, is a different beast entirely. There’s still a remarkable passion, but this time it’s slower, they are moving with ease rather than fear, with love rather than hate, and he’s not worried that someone will catch them at any moment. He knows that tonight, the world is just him, her, and the fire crackling warmly in the hearth. 

Rey presses him back into the mattress, her body shifting to cover his as he finds himself surrounded by her heat. It’s her usual brand of head-spinning and dizzy she brings him, her bared hands coming up to caress his cheeks while she swings a leg over his hips, then pulls him up to her. 

Now he’s sitting up with her in his lap, his hands resting at her hips as he continues kissing her like it’s his life’s mission. Her arms wrap around his neck, her body pressing further into his as his hands reach for the ribbon wrapped around her waist.

Just like the ones tying back her hair, his fingers make quick work of the one holding her dress to her waist, the ribbon falling to the mattress with her gloves and other ribbons as he begins undoing the buttons that close her dress. Rey’s fingers fall from his neck in turn, taking the knot that keeps his cravat in place and undoing it as his find themselves midway down the row on her upper back. 

His heart beats in double time as he finishes the row, then he pulls back from the kiss, wanting to witness every second of this. She watches him with hooded eyes and parted lips, her breathing forcefully even as he takes hold of her sleeves, and begins to slide them down from her shoulders. It isn’t long before the edge of her corset is visible, and she’s helping him to slide the sleeves off of her arms all the way, both of them maintaining this odd, false sense of serenity as they push the dress from her top half, and just like the dream he’d had when he’d been sick, she’s there before him with naught but the lace of that corset covering her chest. 

The thought of seeing her breasts makes him dizzy, but he pushes on, remembering that he’d already seen one of them last year by the oak tree. He just needs to see the other. 

With an unsteady hand, he reaches up to touch her skin, his fingertips brushing gently over the swell of her breast as his palm covers the swell. He can feel her heartbeat with his hand like this, can feel the way it’s racing even faster than his, and he hadn’t ever thought that would be possible. She’s anticipating this just as much as he is, though, and that gives him chills. 

Squeezing her breast lightly, he moves his hand down toward her waist, his other hand guiding her to stand as he works to remove the remainder of the dress. If he’s going to see all of her, god damn it; he has to put some effort in. 

Rey finishes her work on his cravat as she stands, and the first piece of clothing belonging to him lands in the pile of ribbons and gloves they’ve been amassing before she pushes the dress down from her hips, and it pools to the floor in a sea of white lace. 

He wastes no time in admiring what she’s exposed. His hands caress her hips, her waist, her back, pulling her between his legs as he stares openly. She hasn’t even shown him much yet, but given how improper this sort of thing had been just a year ago, he isn’t going to take a half dressed Rey for granted. 

If she notices him staring, though, she isn’t paying attention. Her hands have dedicated themselves to the task of divesting him of his jacket and vest, undoing the buttons of each before she slides them off his shoulders. Not wanting to be outdone, he shucks off the offending clothing, and reaches around for the laces of her corset, his fingers gripping them as she grips the hem of his shirt. His focus is utterly ruined for a moment as his wife’s fingers begin to skim gently up the skin of his torso, exploring the contours of his abdominal muscles as he tries not to fall apart already just from the feeling of her touching his bare skin. 

If he thought he’d been robbed of the chance to see her before, she hadn’t seen hardly anything of him. 

“Rey,” he whispers, pulling away from her to pull his shirt over his head, leaving him in just his trousers and boots. 

“We were uneven,” she says, then they both laugh softly as her hands caress his cheeks. 

A grin remains on his lips even when their laughter fades into silence. “I do believe, your grace, that we are still uneven.”

“And I believe that is no longer my title.”

She is looking down at him expectantly, as if she’s waiting for him to correct himself, but he won’t. This woman is his grace, and sure, she’s also his princess now, but he has called her by her former title for as long as he can remember. It had started as a way to pester her, that is true, but now it’s something sweeter. It’s nicer, kinder, and he loves doing it. “Forgive me,  _ your grace. _ ” 

“You’re a menace.” But she still takes his hands by the wrists and guides them to her back anyway, watching him as he continues undoing the laces of her corset. “An absolute cock.”

“You love my cock.”

“I detest your cock, it’s brought me nothing but trouble.”

“And yet here we are,” he whispers as he finally manages to undo the strings of the corset. Instead of letting it fall, though, he holds onto it, his fingers gripping it tight as she freezes with the curiosity of what he is going to do next. “We are past the loathing, Rey.” Before he can even think another word, he pulls her forward, pressing a kiss to her abdomen just beneath her breasts, the fabric of the corset surprisingly soft beneath his lips. “We don’t need to pretend anymore.”

“I was only teasing,” she says, then she takes hold of his hand again, peeling his fingers from their grip on the open back of her corset as his eyes are drawn right back to her chest. “Now would you please do us both a favor? You’re still holding on.” She peels off the last finger, and the corset falls to the floor, exposing her full upper body to him for the first time. “Let go.”

He barely hears those last two words. All he can think is how utterly magnificent she is. Her nipples are a dusky rose color, he knows this from when he’d seen one fall free from her dress last year, but in the shadows that flicker in the firelight, they look darker. 

Desire welling within him, Ben splayed his palm out over the upper half of her abdomen, his fingers resting over the gentle swell as he just stares at her, barely even blinking. If he blinks, that’s another half a second in which he isn’t taking all of this in. 

Every second of what happens tonight is precious, and he can’t look away. 

“You’re so beautiful,” he whispers, taking one of her nipples between his fingers, and pinching it gently, causing her to sigh blissfully as he rubs circles into it, her body nearly collapsing against his as she comes forward, and swings a leg over his thigh. “Rey…”

She’s straddling his lap now, his face perfectly aligned with her chest, and so he buries his face in it, pressing kisses to the center of her chest. The bone beneath is hard and rigid, but her skin is soft, her breasts are soft, and so he brings his kisses there, kissing the one he hadn’t paid attention to earlier, the side of her chest he knows he hasn’t seen. 

Shivers run through her body as he continues kissing closer and closer to her nipple, her hands finding their way home into his hair as he finally presses a kiss over the pebbled skin, and he stops there, breathing deeply as if he won’t be able to get oxygen ever again. “Fuck,” he breathes, then he takes her nipple into his mouth, sucking gently as she tugs at his hair, his scalp aching as he circles it with his tongue, and she moans on top of him. 

“Oh  _ god _ , Ben…” 

There isn’t any particular taste, not like there had been when he’d gone down on her last year, but he still feels this electric sort of buzz doing it that makes his head feel light. It’s like floating when he hears her whimper his name. No, not floating, flying, as if he’s soaring through the sky on wings, adrenaline pumping through his veins as he sucks and nips at the taut peak, Rey bucking against him with every gentle little touch. 

Eventually, he moves over to the other breast, feeling as though he’s neglected it as he begins planting kisses in the valley between them. It is, in all honesty, a crime that he’s committed against her. The way she sings against him, the way she praises him, it’s as if she’s discovered the eighth of the seven wonders. “Don’t stop,” she begs him. “Please don’t stop.”

He laughs against her skin. “Rey, if I don’t stop, we’ll never finish this night the way I know we both want to.” Looking down, he frowns as he realizes they’re both still wearing trousers. He even has his boots on. “And I have been looking forward to this--” He kisses her on the jaw. “For a very long time.”

“It’s only been a year.”

“A criminal length of time,” he protests, kissing her on the cheek close to the corner of her mouth. “I should have come after you the next day, should have spent the last year doing this again and again even if we never stopped fighting.”

She blinks at him, but before she can say anything, he kisses her on the mouth, absorbing her hum of shock while his hands make quick work of the laces of her underthings. The instant those are undone, he’s pushing them down over her hips, her thighs, and they’re pooling to the floor as well, his kisses becoming a frenzied, hurried mess as he holds her tight, preparing himself for this moment in which he will see her for the first time. 

He breaks away as her hands reach for the laces of his trousers, his feet kicking off his boots as he keeps his eyes closed. Somehow, though it is unspoken, they have both agreed not to look at one another until they are both undressed. The thought of it makes his already hard cock twitch, and he’s sure she can feel it as he lifts his hips from the bed, his body relaxing against the mattress a second later as she peels the remaining fabric over his thighs, and it too falls to the floor by the bed. 

It’s now that he opens his eyes, sitting up to take sight of her as she crawls back into his lap, her eyes washing over him in turn as her lifts her in his arms, shifting them so that his head is resting on the pillows at the near side of the bed, propped up so that he can properly gaze upon his wife. 

His hands sweep over the newly exposed skin, ghosting over her hips before they make their way over the gentle swell of her ass, his fingers digging into her skin there as she sighs on top of him, her hands tracing the contours of his muscles. “You look like a statue.”

A half-hearted laugh of disbelief escapes him. “Thank you?”

“You know. One of those fancy ones art collectors tout all over the world,” she tells him as her hands brush over the hair at the base of his cock. “I was trying to tell you that I think you’re like a work of art, but it didn’t really come out right.”

“Oh…” 

A shy smile blossoms on her face, then she reaches for his cock, stroking him gently as he begins to shiver beneath her. “I think you shouldn’t wear clothes when we’re together,” she says, continuing to stroke him slowly, agonizingly slowly, and he knows if she keeps that up that he won’t last much longer. 

“And I could say the same about you, but Rey?”

“Yes?”

“I’m not going to last much longer if you keep doing that, your grace.”

Frowning, she releases her grip on his cock, her hands reaching for his instead as they free him from their grip on her ass. “Then why don’t you touch me?” She leans down as she presses his hands against her upper thighs, the tips of his fingers brushing up against her apex as he tries to control his breathing. “I believe you’re in my debt. Remember the tree?”

Oh, he does. He’s trying very hard to forget. His rushed, sudden confession makes him wince at night when he’s trying to fall asleep, and though he’s told her again since then and she’s admitted she loves him back, it’s still remarkably awkward. “How could I forget?”

“You should know I loved hearing you say that. Even when I was in the—“ she gasps sharply as his thumb presses against her clit. “—thick of hating you.”

“You liked that idea?” He slipped a finger past her clit, rubbing against her entrance as she shakes on top of him. His control slips for half a second as he realizes how wet she is. “Me loving you?”

“I—I didn’t know—“ she gasps again before she can finish her sentence, his finger pressing gently inside of her as Rey shudders on top of him, nearly collapsing as she braces her palms against his chest. “ _ Ben… _ ”

“I’m here,” he whispers, curling his finger inside of her as his thumb continues rubbing circles into her clit. For a second, he worries that it’s not enough, but then he hears another series of sweet, beautiful moans that fill his body with joy as he begins pumping that single finger in and out of her. “I’m never going to leave.”

Her fingernails dig into his skin, her thumb brushing over his nipple as he struggles to focus on what he’s doing, his cock becoming impossibly hard as he watches his finger vanish inside of her repeatedly, his eyes never leaving the place where they’re joined. “ _ Fuck.” _

This isn’t even the highlight of their evening, isn’t even what they’ve come here for, and he isn’t the one experiencing pleasure, but he is perfectly content with spending the evening just like this. uIt’s this thought that makes him slowly, curiously, press another finger inside of her, stretching her just a fraction more in anticipation of what’s to come. Sure, they’ve done this before, but it’s been a year and he doesn’t know how well she’d take it if he stopped here. 

This needs to be perfect for both of them, something they’ll always remember just like last year. He can’t rush this. It has to be absolutely perfect. 

Incoherent curses and ramblings flee her lips with every passing second, and as his fingers curl inside of her, he is rewarded with a series of loud moans, ones that echo off of his bedroom walls and make him worry that other people in the castle can hear them. Technically, everyone knows what they are doing, but no one wants to actually hear it. No one will ever actually discuss it. 

There’s a reason they have never spoken to another soul about their forbidden tryst last summer. They both know it well. 

“Ben, I’m close,” she warns him, and he almost wishes she hadn’t just so he could’ve been rewarded with the unexpected feeling of her coming apart around him, but he likes knowing what’s going to happen, too. He finds something remarkable about how he can feel her losing the last tendrils of her control, her movements a shaky, disorganized mess, her cries of his name becoming stuttered and unintelligible. It’s the closest thing he thinks he will ever find to magic, and he never wants to let it go. 

“Come for me, your grace,” he whispers, remembering that she liked it when he called her that last year, maybe she wanted him to call her by her new title now, but this was something that was theirs, something that belonged to them. “Come for me.”

_ “Ben! _ ” she cries, and then he feels it, that familiar fluttering that tells him she’s falling apart around his fingers, that she has reached her first peak of the evening, and he fights back another full body shudder as he imagines her doing this again and again, her blissed out face shining with sweat in the firelight. He wants that for her, for them, but most of all he wants this night to never end, for all of this to just go on forever. 

It will, though, even when the sun rises, the rings on their fingers promise them that they will get to have a lifetime of this. Their days will be filled just like this if they want them to be. Well, this and perhaps occasionally diplomatic matters as is their duty, as is what comes with ruling a kingdom, but their nights? He plans on spending them exactly like this. 

As Rey comes down from her high, Ben reaches up with his free hand to stroke a piece of hair from her face, living for how soft it is beneath his fingertips. “How are you feeling?” he asks, his voice quiet as he pulls his fingers from her cunt, licking them clean as she watches with hungry eyes. 

“Good,” she replies, smiling even as her chest heaves. “Really good.”

He laughs as he wraps his arms around her waist, pulling her into a kiss that has her humming against him as he falls into that sweet oblivion that comes with every kiss they share. This one is relatively short since they’re both still out of breath, but it’s nice, calming, and sweet. 

When the kiss ends, he twists his hips around and rolls them over, staring down at where her hair has splayed out on his pillow. It makes him remember the first time they’d done this, and he can almost see the dappled sunlight shining on her face. This time, though, it is replaced by the flickering light of his fireplace, the soft crackling filling his ears as he counts the freckles on her face. “And you’re sure you want to keep going?”

“Do you really need to ask me that?” 

“Of course.”

“Yes, Ben, I want to keep going. I want you to come, too.” She shifts her hands, her fingers lacing behind his neck. “Besides, it’s technically our royal duty to do this. For our country.”

That makes him realize something. “Rey, you know why they expect us to do this, right?” 

She swallows nervously, but nods. “I know.”

“And we’re nowhere near ready for that kind of thing, or even that conversation.” He brushes back a strand of her hair again, gently stroking the waves he’s longed so desperately to see. “We’ve only just begun. I’m not ready to invite anyone else into what’s happening between us.”

“I know. Neither am I, and I know it’s what we’re supposed to do, but I don’t think it’s something I’ve ever wanted?” 

“Yeah.” He props his head up on his hand, his elbow on the pillow beside her as he thinks through his response. “I kind of feel the same way.”

A relieved sigh fell from her lips, as if he’d just lifted some massive weight from her shoulders. “That’s good.”

“Rey, I’m not ever going to ask you to do anything you don’t want me to,” he promises her, hoping she understands that this marriage, in spite of the pressures put on them by their roles in society, is going to be about them. He will do everything in his power to insure it will be like this. “We’ll cross that bridge when we want to and not a second earlier if we cross it at all.”

She gives him a soft little laugh, then she is tucking strands of  _ his  _ hair behind his ear. “But they’re going to expect us to.”

“I don’t care. We’ll take our time,” he whispers, then he pulls back. “Besides, there’s something about the idea of my come on your skin that appeals to me deeply.” He kisses her cheek. “Or whatever other way you want to make sure we don’t accidentally jump into something we aren’t ready for.”

He watches her cheeks flush pink. “Uh, we brought over some tea, one of those, uh, you know—“

“I know.”

“Right, so if you want to come inside of me—“ She wraps a leg around his hip, her heel digging into his ass just where it meets his thigh as she pulls him back on top of her. “You can.”

He wants to, he really wants to, but he doesn't know what to do, what to think. A part of him desperately wants to just throw caution to the wind and come inside of her like she wants, but another part knows they need to be careful these first few times they do this. “You’re sure?”

“Please.” His wife pulls him closer, his cock pressing against her wet entrance, and just the promise of being inside of her makes him feel as if he’s flying again. “Just fuck me.”

This isn’t going to be just fucking, but he understands her meaning. With another soft laugh, he presses his cock against her cunt, pushing his tip inside of her as she takes in a shaky breath. “I can do that, your grace,” he promises her, then he feels her hands come around to grip his shoulders, her fingernails burrowing into the skin there, and he knows he’s going to have scratch marks in the morning. 

One set will be placed on his chest, and the other will be on his back. He will be marked by her and he can’t think of a better way to wake up.

“Tell me if you want me to stop, if I’m hurting you.”

“You won’t.” She uses the heel that’s hooked into the muscles of his ass to tug him into her a little further, both of them whimpering softly from the feeling. “You didn’t last year.”

“Last year I was a scared boy.” Pushing another inch inside of her, he remembers the way he’d done this last time, how scared and nervous he’d been, his body fueled by hatred and lust. This time is different. This time it’s softer, more tender, It’s loving now, the way he wants it to be. “I’m not scared anymore. I know what I feel for you now.”

“And what do you feel for me?” she asks, her nails digging into his skin as he groans his approval, finding it rather pleasant. There’s something about the way the pain sets his nerves on fire that he yearns to feel again and again even though it isn’t over yet. 

“You know what I feel.”

Another gasp parts her lips as her head tilts back into the pillow, and he eases himself a little further inside of her. “Say it then,” she begs him, her breathing coming out in short pants even though he’s barely done anything to her so far. “Say it.”

“I love you,” he whispers, kissing her briefly as he finishes that last word. “I love you.” He kisses her again down by the line of her jaw. “I wish I’d said it sooner.”

“I love you, too.” Then she winces slightly, and he stops moving, stops breathing, until she gives him a nod. “You can move.”

All he does is kiss her again, his lips moving against hers for a few blissful, joyous seconds, then he starts moving his hips, thrusting gently inside of her as she holds onto him for dear life. Little does she know he will never let her go. She’ll always have a place in his arms. Always. 

Rey feels like heaven around him, she’s warm, soft, and the slightest big tight, and with every thrust he gives he knows he isn’t going to last long. The combination of that and her kisses is intoxicating, better than any wine he could possibly drink, like he’s soaking up rays of sunlight in his skin but it doesn’t hurt. It’s remarkable. 

It still strikes him as impossible that they’ve somehow grown enough to this, that somehow, in spite of all the arguing over the years, they’ve still wound up here. If he’d been told a year ago in the aftermath of what had happened between them that he would be here again, he wouldn’t have believed it. 

The impossible, though, tends to happen every day. Well, that and he thinks nothing is truly impossible. Not anymore, not with them. 

“Ben,” she whispers as she grinds her hips against his, and just as he starts laughing, she shifts her hips, and he suddenly finds himself pinned beneath her. 

“You are full of surprises, aren’t you?” His hands come around to cup her ass, fingers digging into her cheeks as Rey’s palms rest again on his chest. 

She doesn’t answer, she just leans down and kisses him again, her hips grinding against his as she rides him into his mattress, and that feeling that comes with his control leaving him takes over, he’s surrendered to her completely. He’s hers, and  _ god _ he never wants to leave this bed. He’ll stay here forever if he can help it. 

A moan escapes him as his cock presses against somewhere deep inside of her, and she gasps against him in turn. Her next breath is stolen from her with a kiss, and her body softens against his momentarily as she experiences what he knows must be some sort of dizzy spell, the same sort he always gets when he’s around her. 

The corners of his mouth tug into a smile as he thrusts up into her a little harder, a little faster. She takes him in deeper as he does this, his body moving perfectly in time with hers. They move together, as one, and he can feel himself getting close as the seconds pass. 

“Rey,” he whispers against her lips. 

“Shhh, don’t talk,” she replies, then she’s kissing him again. 

Still, he’s determined, he needs to warn her. “I’m gonna come,” he pants out, and then she breaks away, crawling back onto her hands where they’re pressed against his chest. “I-”

The Duchess gives him a nod. “I know.” 

They both open their eyes then, their irises locked on one another as she rides him with a renewed vigor, clearly wanting him to come just as badly as he does. But maybe he wants her to come, too, maybe he wants her to join him when he falls over the edge, and so he adjusts his hands, bringing one around to the front of her body so that his thumb has access to her clit, circling it slowly, gently as she continues to writhe on top of him. 

“ _ Fuck,”  _ she breathes, her voice muffled by his kiss as he presses harder against her clit, rubbing circles into it faster and faster until she comes apart around him, his cock twitching as he feels her fall over the edge with his name on her lips, her forehead resting against his as he follows her. 

Both of them are crying out incoherently. He can’t tell if he’s whispering her name, a swear, or that he loves her, but he’s thinking all three. As the wave crests, he knows that it’s the hardest he’s ever come in his life, his mind and body whiting out as he spills inside of her, as he falls into a new world with her, and they slowly come down together, as one. 

His hand falls back onto the mattress as she rides him through the last of it, her lips trailing along his cheek onto his neck as her hand slides up into his, and their fingers lace together, holding on for dear life as they ride out the aftershocks together. 

This is what heaven must be like, the sheer ecstasy he feels now stretched out into forever. That is how he wants to die, completely blissed out and in her arms. 

As they come down from their high, Rey cups his face in her free hand, sliding free of his cock as she rests on top of him. He can feel his come spilling out between her thighs onto his stomach, but he doesn’t care, he’s too content with his life, with the way things have gone, and so he ends up just taking time to memorize the way it feels to hold her. 

He hasn’t really gotten to do this yet. When he’d been sick she’d just been caring for him. When they’d done this last year she’d bound his hands over his head with hers, and while it had been the most erotic moment of his life, it had prohibited him from holding her the way he’d wanted to. 

Now he’s holding her properly, the way he’s always wanted to, and as she kisses him again, he lets his eyes close, drifting shut as Rey holds him in turn. The kiss, of course, remains short, its brevity causing them both to giggle as they pull apart, and he’s allowed a moment to just admire her. “Hello.”

“Hello,” she replies, then they’re kissing again, his hands twining themselves in her hair as he pulls her in closer. “Was that-?”

“Good? Yes,” he assures her, his chest heaving with the proof of it. 

“I thought so, too.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, I think that’s exactly what we should’ve done a year ago.” She begins stroking his cheek with her thumb. “And maybe what we should…” A hopeful glint appears in her eyes, and he can see a smirk he knows all too well from looking in the mirror on her face. “What we should do again?”

Laughter shakes his chest, shaking them both as he brushes back the mussed up hair from her face. “You want to go again?”

“Of course I do.”

“All right, well, we’ll have to wait a minute. I need a second to catch my breath.”

“But I don’t.” she replies, sounding coy as she begins letting her hands drift down onto his shoulders. “And I’ve been wanting you to put your mouth on me again since the last time we did this.”

“Oh?”

“Yes, so if you wouldn’t mind, your highness…” She begins crawling forward, her lips hovering just over his as she finishes her sentence. “The night is young.”

Without letting him get another word in, she kisses him, rolling them back on the mattress as he becomes dizzy all over again, and their wedding night continues. 


	11. Finale

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH FOR THE RESPONSE TO THIS IT BLEW ME AWAY I LOVE YALL SO MUCH 
> 
> Here’s some [art](https://twitter.com/spacewafflehou1/status/1270145389665095683?s=21) I did for the flashback from chapter one!

Their wedding night passes in a blissful blur he is fortunate enough to recall most of. The second time he tastes Rey, like everything else he’s done that evening, he takes his time, his tongue lapping gently at the apex of her thighs as she writhes beneath him, her hands falling into his hair as he presses a finger inside of her, then a second. 

They remain like that until she falls apart, and while initially he’d been intending to make love to her again after, they instead decide to hold one another, whispering softly until they pull the blankets back, and fall asleep beneath them. 

His dreams, for once, are frighteningly lifelike. In every single one he’s smiling, the sun is out, and he can’t really see the sky but he can see the golden rays against her skin, the gentle tan that’s forming on her body where her dress leaves her exposed. What is perhaps a sign that he is dreaming, though, is that Rey is running with him in just her corset and underskirts, her feet are bare, and they’re both kicking up sand as they run along a beach in a manner that is most definitely inappropriate. 

But there’s no one around for miles, he knows they’re safe. As long as they are together, they will be safe. What they are protected from, he isn’t sure. He just knows that Rey and her warm laugh and sunny grin are going to light his nights. 

_ God,  _ he’s so besotted. He wishes he’d figured it out sooner. 

*

_“Join me!”_ _Dream Rey shouts to him, her skirts being soaked by the gentle lapping is the ocean waves against its hem. “The water’s warm!”_

_ “Why do you think I’ve been running after you?” he cries, finally catching up to her so he can wrap his arms around her, spinning his wife over the edge of the sea as she shrieks with laughter. “You need to stop running so fast.” _

_ She grins against his lips as he kisses her. “And  _ you  _ need to start running faster.” Then she sighs. “We would’ve made terrible battlefield enemies.” _

_ A flurry of emotions wells within him at the memory of their beginning.  _ God,  _ is he sorry for all the arguments he started, for his part in all the feuding they had done. “Oh we would have. But why do you think so?” _

_ “Because you would never catch me,” she tells him as he sets her feet back down in the water, her hands falling to his bare chest. “You would just chase and chase and chase. You would never succeed at capture.” _

_ She’s most certainly correct, but he just nods, his lips parting in another grin. “And you are a tease.” _

_ His wife nods. “I know,“ she says, then she’s kissing him again, making him hyper aware of how calm everything is. Everything from the rhythmic roar of the ocean in the background, to the golden sunshine beaming on his back makes him feel complete. It makes him feel at peace.  _

_ There’s no telling how many years theyhave been married in the stream, in the last one he’d had, they had been married for five years, but in this one he has no idea, and he doesn’t want to ask her. Asking Rey in this instance how long they had been married would be cause for her to frown, and he doesn’t want her to frown, he just wants to keep seeing that smile that is like a second sun.  _

_ Still, he has to know. He just has to be clever about it. How? _

_ “I truly love being married to you, far more than I thought I would before we started this.” _

_ “And I thought the same about you,” she replies, brushing back a strand of his hair from his forehead, and behind his ear. Normally he refrains from ever letting his ear see daylight, but when she’s touching him, he finds his usual anxiety is gone. “Happy anniversary, Ben.” _

_ Just one year then. One year of pure bliss, one year where they’ve grown together and learned how to love one another, how to be friends. “Happy anniversary, Rey.”  _

_ She leans forward, and presses her forehead against his. “I love you,” she tells him. “I don’t say it enough.” _

_ “Rey, you could only ever say it once and it would be enough.” He leans forward to press a kiss to her nose. “I know how you feel. There are more ways to tell someone you love them than just words.” _

_ “Yeah, there are,” she replies, then she kisses him again, allowing him to feel with every little brush of her lips against his, every little word she isn’t saying as she proves his point. Saying it out loud is far from the only way to say it, and she proves it with everything she does.  _

_ She makes him certain that this marriage is so much more than what it seems on the surface.  _

*

He wakes well after dawn. The sun is high in the sky, its rays shining through his window and onto him and his sleeping wife as he cradles her head to his chest, shielding her from the blinding light. He finds himself wondering why he’s facing the damned window in the first place, but in truth, he doesn’t care, he’s just glad he didn’t wake up alone, he’s gotten tired of that feeling lately. 

Now he yearns for the day in which he won’t remember what it feels like to be alone in the morning anymore. He needs it like he needs the air he breathes, needs  _ her _ more than anything. 

For a moment, he just settles himself in the contentment of watching her sleep. Her face is the picture of neutrality, the little lines that normally crease her forehead and eyes from the rage she’d previously carried for him have softened. The only thing that shows any emotion is the tiny little upturn of her lips, which give away the barest hint of a smile, and make him feel as if he’s the luckiest man in the world. 

Perhaps he is. No one else on earth will ever see the Duchess—Princess—like this. No one will ever know just how gentle, how  _ good _ , she is. There’s a soft side of both of them that he knows they both reserve just for each other, that they both hide away from anyone else, and he’s so god damned privileged to get to see this side of her. 

Truly, he is the luckiest man alive. 

Rey stirs in his arms then, slowly coming into consciousness. He wonders what she’d dreamt of, if she had thought of him and their new marriage, or if she’d just had a restful night blissfully unaware of the passage of time. Odds are, he’ll find out soon. 

The arm she has slung around his waist tightens its grip, pulling him closer as she sighs her relief that he’s in her arms. A tiny chuckle leaves him in response—they truly are two sides of the same coin, aren't they? He’d been just as relieved minutes earlier to find that  _ she  _ was in  _ his  _ arms. 

“Good morning, wife,” he whispers, and he can feel her smiling against his chest just before she tilts her head up, and he’s met with the kaleidoscope of color in her irises. 

“Good morning.”

He snorts. “Oh come now, I said it to you, the least you could do is return the favor.” Pressing a kiss to her forehead, he briefly thinks back on the dream he’d had, how he didn’t need to hear her say the words “I love you,” to know she loved him, how that would forever ring true, and how even right now he doesn’t need to hear her call him husband to know that’s what he is to her. He just likes to hear her say it. 

“Husband.” It’s spoken against his lips. Without warning, she surges upward and presses hers against his, causing him to gasp against her as he presses his body into hers. “You’re a menace.”

“But you love me,” he reminds her as he goes in for another kiss, delighting in the way he’d naked body fits beneath his—and also the simple fact that she is still naked from last night. “For all my flaws.”

“Oh yes, and you have quite a lot of them.” She’s supposed to be scolding him, but all it does is cause the prince to giggle again. “I am just glad I no longer have to fight you because of them. Being at war with you was exhausting.”

“Mmm, agreed.” Another kiss gets pressed to the line of her jaw. “I rather liked the times our arguments ended in a scandalous manner.”

“That only happened three times, Ben.”

“Two. I don’t count that time against the tree.” His voice fell quiet, his entire demeanor growing soft as he rested his forehead against hers, just like he had in his dream. “That was when I told you I loved you. We stopped being enemies that day.”

Blinking at him, her face slowly fell, but not into sadness, it was something else he couldn’t quite read, then she was grinning. “Okay, twice, but they were both wonderful.”

“Yes, I quite look forward to being in a carriage with you again.”

“Why? So you can wipe come from the inside of your trousers in a washroom again?”

“Piss off.” 

More laughter spills from her lips as he begins to attack her neck with sweet little kisses, his body pressing further into hers as she cries out his name. “Ben, we need to get out of bed. The staff will be here soon to make it. We have a breakfast to attend.”

He shakes his head. “Do you see how high the sun is? We missed breakfast long ago, my love.” Then he leans down, and presses another brief kiss to her lips that leaves him dizzy. Little rainbow dots fill his vision, but the image of her smile remains clear in his imagination, shining brighter than the sun in his mind’s eye as he pulls back from the kiss. “Perhaps we will be ready by lunch.”

“Perhaps,” she replies, then she brushes back the strands of his hair forming a curtain around his face, her eyes glancing between his as she bites her lip. “I love you.”

_ I don’t say it enough _ , she’d said in his dream, and he’s starting to think this is where it differs from reality. So far, he’s lived two days in a row where Rey has told him she loves him. If he’s a fortunate man, he’ll see more, and while this is already enough, he knows he’ll be glad to hear it every day if she so chooses. 

“And I love you,” he replies, then he shifts onto his side. 

“I know.” Shifting to match him, Rey’s hand comes up to caress his cheek a second later as he watches the gears of her brain turn trying to think of what to say next. “We should get out of bed.”

“We should.”

A pause. “Five more minutes?”

“That is fine by me, your grace, I was planning to kiss you one more time before we dressed for the day.”

“How wonderful. Would you please do it then? I don’t think I’ve kissed you enou—“ 

Cutting her off with his lips has never felt so sweet. She hums against him as he captures her in the kiss, setting a slow, steady rhythm in spite of how little time they have before they’re due for lunch in the castle dining room. They should be moving quickly, but he still kisses her as if they have all of the time in the world. 

That’s all he wants to do, and though he’s going to have a lifetime of royal duties and eventually governing the country, he knows that his spare time, those precious few moments in between every piece of the insanity, is going to be spent just like this. Somehow, in spite of all the odds, he’s fallen in love with his arch nemesis, and now that things have changed between them, now that they’re married, he plans to show her all of the ways he’s capable of spending that time. 

And so they melt into the daylight, clinging to one another as if they’ll never let go, letting the other person know that even when they are apart, they will always be loved. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 


End file.
